Tintin Forums

Can someone tell me when the Totor strips finished?
I know they started in 1926 and were published monthly in a scout magazine. I have read that they finished in 1930, but the Archives Hergé book only contains twenty-one episodes - less than two years' worth. This means that there were Totor strips after the America story and after Tintin began, or the Totor strip had really finished before 1930.

My second question is, why were the captions in the Totor strips changed to a different font when they were published in the Archives Hergé?

Many thanks

I think Totor ended in 1928, anyway I know it didn't continue after Tintin!

I'm sorry I can't help you with the second question.

-Vlipvlop

Thanks Vlipvlop

Is it a major change? Does the new font look completely different, or is it approximately the same?

My guess would be that the artwork survived, but the text panels didn't, and they simply created new text for the pictures, or that the art was reproduced from a printed source, so new text was laid in for clarity.

Does it really matter? I doubt that Hergé was involved in any way with the original choice of font, so the producers/ designers of the book probably felt it didn't make any difference...

It was different enough for me to notice. No, I don't suppose it does matter, but I'm just interested. You can ask "does it really matter?" about anything. Truth is that most of the questions people ask on forums like this don't really matter in the scheme of things, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't ask about things if we're curious, does it?

Oh, I agree - the question wasn't meant to belittle or dismiss the curiosity value of the enquiry! The forums are exactly the place for questions to be asked.

However, in this case, the text as typeset is perhaps tangential to the world of Hergé and the Totor story; that was the part about what matters. If they kept the text the same, but re-drew the pictures, now that would be a greater cause for concern.

I wonder if there wasn't some perhaps readily apparent reason such as the original text was perhaps unclear, and the later version sorted that?

Are the Totor strips any good? I presume they are quite similar in style to Soviets and Congo but definetly of archival interest. I don't suppose it has ever been translated to English?

I think the Totor strips are quite good. You're right in that they're quite similar to the early Tintin stories. The main difference is that, not knowing very much French, I find Totor more difficult to follow than Tintin. I can usually translate the speech bubbles in Tintin, but the text under the Totor drawings is more difficult. I think they're worth having if you like the early Tintin stories, but I'm pretty sure they have been translated into English.

Well, I just came from the library, and what do you know! I have a book about Totor! Anyway, this is the way it is from what I understand it:

Totor started in July 1926 in the monthly periodical Le Boy-Scout Belge.

It continued there until July 1929, with 26 pages having been published. After this, Hergé went to work on Tintin.

Now, the part about 1930: Between February and July 1930, Totor's adventures where continued, this time by an artist called Evany (Eugène Van Nijverseel).

So, the "real" Totor, done by Hergé, ended in 1929, so I suppose that's the one that was published in Archives Hergé.

Hope it helps,
-Gustav

Excellent research there, Gustav!

It makes sense, because Evany was Hergé's assistant, and may have inked pages of Soviets and Quick & Flupke for him.

Does it say how many pages Evany did, and if they were in the style of Hergé?