Ode to Calvin and Hobbes, the reading duvet par excellence!

Do you have a job to pamper? What you read, do you reread regularly? The one that accompanies you every summer or that you reserve for the evenings in the biting cold of winter, curled up at home, nice and warm?

What I will tell you about is mine, finally the one that my bookseller introduced me to not long ago, and for which I feel eternal gratitude.

Today we talk about the immense work of artist Bill Watterson: Calvin and Hobbes.

Bill Watterson, the mystery author

You should know that Bill Watterson is a decent author. Few signs of his life are sent outside: he lives rather secluded in the depths of America.

The last time we had dealings with him was when he was elected honorary president of the Angoulême festival where he provided the originals of Calvin and Hobbes for an exhibition dedicated to him.

The author’s secret personality helps to mystify his work even more, for which he also refuses that derivative products exist. Don’t count on a Hobbes plush toy or an obscure attempt at a 3D cartoon.

Calvin and Hobbes it is a monument of comics, and to distort it in one way or another would risk tarnishing it. Is it excessive? Nothing is ever excessive when faced with a masterpiece.

It’s all good and it’s nice to repeat that it’s a marvel. But what’s so great about this series? Come on, sit down and let me tell you.

The antihero and his double reading

Calvin and Hobbes is a series of comics featuring a blond boy with shaggy hair and a more or less stuffed tiger.

Calvin is a damned brat, looking for the first stupid thing to do or the first annoyance to arouse in his parents.S. Obviously this allows you to create many more absurd situations than if he were too calm and friendly.

He is an antihero figure and seems to have inspired many races of more or less docile scoundrels, from Titeuf to the student Ducobu, via Cédric or even, in another style, Mortelle Adèle.

Calvin isn’t the only character worthy of interest. Hobbes is also a gold mine!

He is the cute tiger come to life, always ready to assist Calvino in his misdeeds, but also to reassure her, to comfort him. Sometimes he is very wise, other times quite stupid. In short, this duo sparks!

What I like most about this series is the perpetual hesitation between the real or imaginary existence of the tiger in the stories. It’s a bit like inside History of the toyyou see.

So sometimes we let ourselves believe that the stories are those that the child tells himself and put on paper, sometimes that this tiger is very real, a real domestic tiger. Which makes for a richer read!

A work accessible to all generations

You know what’s also incredibly awesome (get ready for a lexical field of praise in this article, if you haven’t already) with Calvin and Hobbes ? It is its ability to resonate with all generations.

Not only does it not age and can be read with great pleasure today, but it also has the virtuosity of being able to be read differently depending on the age at which one approaches.

A young reader who has just converted to reading will have the pleasure of discovering the imaginative adventures of this cheeky – and slightly naive – boy.

But adults will also be nourished by all of Calvino’s existential and life-filled questions, and will only be able to note the infinite depth of his philosophical words.

The art of savoring small joys

Speaking of philosophy, I must also tell you about the work’s ability to promote small pleasuresS. These are found in closeness to others, in friendship, in tenderness.

But they are also contemplative, whether looking at the starry sky or enjoying the calm of nature.

Between two bad things, Calvin knows how to appreciate what surrounds him with great maturity, to the point of ultimately becoming a character of great inspiration, for adults and children.

Preserve your child’s imagination

Calvin and Hobbesin his ability to maintain hesitations about the existence of Hobbes, in his celebration of Calvin’s jokes and in his tendency to make his life a crazy adventure at every moment, even futile, while proving accessible and also very adult in his words, it’s a wonderful celebration of imagination!

Stripes are like a refuge when real life lacks spice and joy. They invite us to never silence the child that lies dormant in each of us, the one who allows us to see life from another perspective, who allows us to be positive, to infuse it with adventure until it becomes crazy, epic!

Read, reread Calvin and Hobbes! Long live the unbridled imagination and long live the nonsense!

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