Albert Uderzo, the co-creator and illustrator of the "Asterix and Obelix" comics that delighted legions of children and adults over the past six decades, has died aged 92, his family said Tuesday. "Albert Uderzo died in his sleep at his home in Neuilly, after a heart attack that was not linked to the coronavirus. He had been extremely tired for the past several weeks," his son-in-law Bernard de Choisy told AFP.
Uderzo created Asterix in 1959 with the fellow Frenchman and writer Rene Goscinny, who brought them to life in the French-Belgian comics magazine Pilote. The adventures of the shrewd and indomitable Gaul, with his winged helmet and formidable blond moustache, and his massive sidekick Obelix as they gleefully thwarted Roman legionnaires became a huge hit, with translations into dozens of languages.
The series has extended into 38 books, most recently "Asterix and the Chieftain's Daughter" from last year, though Uderzo had stopped illustrating the series in 2011, having carried on alone after Goscinny's death in 1977.
Nearly 1.6 million copies of "The Chieftain's Daughter" were sold last year in France alone, putting it at the top of best-seller lists.
Both men are considered founding fathers of modern comics and graphic novels, with 380 million of their books sold worldwide, and several stories turned into animated cartoons and feature films.
Uderzo was born April 25, 1927, in Fismes, a village in northeast France near Reims, to Italian immigrants - his father was a luthier.
At birth he had six fingers on each hand - an anomaly corrected by surgery - and was colourblind, yet he discovered drawing after joining a Parisian publishing house after World War II, while also providing comic drawings for newspapers.
Uderzo claimed he was inspired by tales from his older brother Bruno, who would head to western France to escape labour conscription by the Nazi occupiers.
The first Asterix book, "Asterix the Gaul," appeared in 1961 and became an overnight sensation, eventually introducing the world of comics to a much wider public.
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