Annotated Asterix

I grew up reading a lot of Asterix (and Tintin) comics in primary school. Whenever there was a library period, there’d be a mad dash for the comic book shelf and a bunch of ten year old boys would engage in a violent free for all for any book with more pictures than words. Knowing that Goscinny and Uderzo did not write Asterix in English, I always was curious at how translations were done so as to create the puns we read in English surrounding characters’ names (eg, Potbellix, Alcoholix, Monotonus). Adults always told me how reading mindless comics like Asterix which were “devoid of any intellectual merit” would rot my brain but as the years past, I also began to realise that there were a lot of in-jokes and historical references in it. However, not knowing anything about European history nor being able to read any of the many Latin phrases sprinkled in the comics, I was left to wonder about it all. I just stumbled on the excellent site, The Asterix Annotations which shows just how rich in references Asterix is. I have a few Asterix omnibus volumes and it’s pretty fun going through it all.

  8:28pm (GMT +11.00)  •  Books  •   •  Tweet This  •  Comments (1)