Tintin Not for Kids

Little, Brown to sell comic as adult collector’s edition

By Staff -- School Library Journal, 9/1/2007

Tintin in the Congo for kids? Little, Brown Books for Young Readers had a change of heart and reversed its decision to reissue the controversial 1931 comic book as a separate edition in the United States.

Instead, the publisher will sell the book as a part of a boxed set, which will be labeled as an “adult collector’s edition.”

Written by author/cartoonist Hergé and set in then-Belgian Congo, the book follows intrepid boy reporter Tintin and his dog Snowy in their adventures among Africans, who are depicted as simple savages prone to cowardice and superstition, and who use phrases like “White mister! You come save us!”

Little, Brown’s initial decision to categorize the book as “childrens/young adult fiction” didn’t sit well with librarians like collection development manager Francisca Goldsmith of the Berkeley Public Library in California and author of Graphic Novels Now (ALA Editions, 2005).

Goldsmith specifically took issue with the fact that most young readers would not read the foreword, which explains that the book reflects the colonial attitudes of the time.

The recent re-release of the graphic novel in other countries has angered many. In Belgium, an African student took legal action to have the book declared racist and removed from bookstores. And its release in Britain earlier this year prompted the Borders bookstore chain to move the book from the children’s section to the adult graphic novels section. The gift set, available in bookstores in the fall, will be priced at $150. It will be shrink-wrapped and include a sell sheet that alerts customers to the controversial content.

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