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10/23/2009

It was in the hot summer of August 1959 that Asterix was born, brainchild of writer René Goscinny and illustrator Albert Uderzo. Just months later, the mustached hero and his rotund sidekick Obelix made their publishing debut in the first edition of Pilote, a comics magazine for children on Oct. 29, 1959.

Their antics were a hit and since then his advance has been unstoppable. In total, 325 million copies of 33 Asterix books translated into 107 languages have been sold around the world. And within France the character enjoys a lofty status: "Asterix is a bit like the Eiffel Tower," publisher Arnaud Noury said recently.

Asterix's celebrations will be spilling across central Paris in the coming days, with concerts, exhibitions, artwork and even an acrobatic display by elite fighter pilots from the French air force. In a film clip soon to be posted on the Asterix Web site, pilots power jets through the sky, leaving trails of smoke in the form of Asterix's head, including the trademark winged helmet.

Goscinny died suddenly in 1977 but Uderzo later continued the series alone, extending an international series of adventures of the warrior, his friend Obelix and his pet, Dogmatix.

Uderzo said the pair originally sought to create an authentically French comic. "What we wanted with Pilote was to create our own, homegrown comic strip heroes, because at the time youth magazines were full of comic strips from America," he told the news conference.

To mark the coming of age, Uderzo, now 82, has penned a new volume, "The Birthday of Asterix and Obelix". Reflecting the zeal of his fans, the initial print run is 3 million.