Asterix comic co-creator, Albert Uderzo, dies aged 92

Asterix comic co-creator, Albert Uderzo, who teamed with Rene Goscinny to create Gaul Asterix (the character with the moustache), died in Paris on Tuesday 24 March 2020, aged 92.

Dargaud, the former publisher of the Asterix comic books, announced Uderzo’s death from heart failure.

Albert Uderzo was born on 25 April 1927 in Fismes, in eastern France. He was born with 12 fingers, but had an operation to remove two of them. He grew up in Paris with his Italian parents.

Albert Uderzo and Rene Goscinny created the Asterix comic series in 1959—60 years ago. Asterix tells of the adventures of an ancient Gaul named Asterix resisting the Romans in 50 BC using a magic potion that gives him superhuman strength. Asterix is described as a weakling who defeats the strong. His friends include Obelix and Dogmatrix.

Uderzo’s partner Rene Goscinny died in 1977, and Uderzo continued the series alone until 2011. Uderzo created Les Editions Albert Rene in 1979, splitting from the publishing house Dargaud. The Asterix series is now written by Jean-Yves Ferri, and drawn by Didier Conrad.

The series is translated into more than 100 languages and there is even a theme park dedicated to Asterix. Les Editions Albert Rene (owned by Hachette) is the company that now owns the rights to the series. In 1966, France’s first space satellite was named Asterix.

Goscinny’s daughter, Anne Goscinny, told Le Parisien on 25 March 2020 that the two men were like brothers, but were as different as ‘fire and water.’

Last year, in 2019, the comic series introduced its first female heroine, Adrenaline, the teenage daughter of Vercingetorix, the chieftain who led the Gauls to rebel against Julius Caesar.

So Asterix the comic series lives on.

MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of: Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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