The Secret of the Unicorn (or as I first read it in Farsi: راز کشتی اسب شاخدار) was the very first volume of Tintin I read. Actually, the first few hundred times it was my dad who read it to me starting when I was around three. It was one of my all-time favorites growing up and I requested it, if not daily, on a very regular basis. Our old Persian copy is torn, battered and loved, my English copy is treated with the utmost respect and care, and I don't have a hard copy of it in French, but I will get one. La Licorne is still one of my favorites, and thankfully, I think, (or I hope) one of the least problematic books in the whole series so I can love it without feeling guilty.
The text below is included in ALL of my reviews for the Tintin series. If you've already read it, feel free to skip it.
I am a lifelong fan of Tintin and Hergé. Tintin was the earliest memory I have of being exposed to books and stories, my dad started to read Tintin to me when I was less than three years old and continued to do so until I learned to read on my own. I have loved these stories my whole life, and I know all of them by heart, in Persian, in English, and in French.
But, as a devout fan, I think it's time to do the hard but right thing: confess that these books are far from perfect. They are full of stereotypes, racist, whitewashed, colonialist, orientalist, you name it. Not to mention a complete lack of female characters (Bianca Castafiore is a mocking relic of the poor dear Maria Callas that Hergé hated, her maid Irma is present in approximately 20 frames, Alcazar's wife also, anyway, there aren't any significant female characters in these books).
In the past few years, I've struggled to decide how I feel about these books. Will I dismiss them? Consider "the time they were written in" and excuse them? Love them in secret? Start disliking them? I don't know. So far I haven't reached a fixed decision, but I will say this: I am aware that these books are problematic. I acknowledge them. I don't stand for the message of some of these books. At the same time, I won't dismiss or hide my love for them because they were an integral part of my growing up memories and fantasies and games, and I do, still, love captain Haddock very much, stupid and ridiculous as he is.