The Castafiore Emerald

Blurb

The Castafiore Emerald is the twenty-first volume of The Adventures of Tintin, the comics series by Belgian cartoonist Hergé. It was serialised weekly from July 1961 to September 1962 in Tintin magazine. The book was considered as an antithesis of the previous Tintin books as Hergé deliberately broke the adventure genre he had created, making it the only book in the Tintin series where the characters remain at Marlinspike Hall and do not venture to another part of the world. The story tells of opera singer Bianca Castafiore's holiday visit to Marlinspike Hall, and the subsequent theft of her emerald, which was gifted to her by the Maharajah of the fictional province of Gopal.
Although The Castafiore Emerald received critical acclaim for making its characters follow a lead of false trails, it was not a commercial success due to the experimental nature of its narrative. It was published as a book by Casterman shortly after its conclusion. Hergé continued The Adventures of Tintin with Flight 714, while the series itself became a defining part of the Franco-Belgian comics tradition. The story was adapted for the 1991 animated series The Adventures of Tintin by Ellipse and Nelvana.