Obelix and Co.

Obelix and Co. is the twenty-third volume of the Asterix comic book series, by René Goscinny (stories) and Albert Uderzo (illustrations).^[1] The book's main focus is on the attempts by the Gaul-occupying Romans to corrupt the one remaining village that still holds out against them by instilling capitalism. It is also the penultimate volume written by Goscinny before his death in 1977; his final volume, Asterix in Belgium, was released after his death in 1979.^[2]

Plot summary

After

Eventually, Caesar becomes angered when he learns that Preposterus' plan is placing him in financial debt. To counter this, Preposterus decides to sell the abundance of menhirs to patricians on the pretext they are a symbol of great wealth and high rank. However, this causes problems as other provinces begin making their own menhirs to sell to the Romans, creating a growing Menhir crisis that is crippling the Roman economy and threatening a civil conflict from the Empire's workforce. To put a stop to this, Caesar orders Preposterus to cease further trading with Gauls or face being thrown to the lions.

Unknown to him, Obelix becomes miserable from the wealth and power he made, having never understood it all, and how much it has changed other villagers, making him wish to go back to enjoying the fun he had with Asterix and Dogmatix. Asterix soon hears of this and agrees to go hunting boar with him if he reverts to his old clothes, knowing that the villagers' lives are about to return to normal. When Preposterus arrives to announce he will not be buying another menhir, the villagers claim Obelix knew of this in advance when he called a halt in his work but did not tell them, causing him to fight with them. Asterix soon breaks up the fight, directing the villagers to attack the Romans for causing the whole mess they are in. As they head off to wreck the camp Preposterus is residing in, Obelix decides to take no part in the fight. While the villagers' wealth is gone, after events in Rome caused the sestertius they received to be devalued, they hold a traditional banquet to celebrate the return to normality.

Economic issues

• The book is a parody of capitalism:
  • While Obelix could hunt boar before, he begins to overwork for the purpose of buying them (and ridiculous clothing). This pointless circle of money is something Obelix never understands in the first place, when all this stress could be prevented by simply hunting and living the simple life like before.
  • Capitalism is also looked at as pointless through the fact that the only thing that represents it by being bought serves no practical purpose, as a menhir is simply a large stone.
• When the makers of Roman menhirs are banned from selling their stock, they block the Roman roads in protest at the loss of their jobs.
• The
  École Nationale d'Administration
  (ENA) through the Nouvelle École d'Affranchis (NEA) in the original.

Cultural references

• The character of Preposterus is a parody of French politician
  President of the Republic
  from 1995 to 2007.
• On page 27, Laurel and Hardy make an appearance as Roman legionaries ordered to unload the menhirs from Obelix's cart.
• When, on page 2, the Romans leave the camp, two of the legionaries are carrying a drunk on a shield. The bearers are Goscinny and Uderzo themselves and the drunk is their friend Pierre Tchernia.
• In this story, camp life for the
  Roman legionaries is shown as undisciplined and complacent, mostly due to the lack of any conflict with the Gaulish villagers during the Menhir trade. In other Asterix adventures they are usually vigilant, clean-shaven, and well-organized; but here the men's faces are covered in stubble
  and life is almost anarchic. This laxity is represented in the watchtower guard, who becomes increasingly dishevelled with every appearance.
• Page 36 of this book was the 1000th page of Asterix. It is the page in which Preposterus uses a number of stone tablets in order to explain his strategy of selling menhirs to an increasingly bewildered Caesar. This panel had been hailed as a remarkable explanation of modern commerce and advertising. To mark this special page 36, there is a small panel with the names of the authors, and right under another small panel with the
  Roman numeral M
  , meaning 1000th, and below a tiny Latin text saying 'Albo notamba lapillo'. It should read 'Albo notanda lapillo', which means literally "To be noted with a white stone" and has given the well-known French expression "à marquer d'une pierre blanche", meaning in English "to go down as a milestone" (alternatively this expression is used in referring more precisely to a calendar day, probable origin of the expression in the Antiquity : albo notanda lapillo dies, "day to be noted with a white stone", meaning "red letter day"-), but it is here purposely misspelled in Latin : "notamba", a pun in French meaning "note en bas", literally "note at the bottom" or footnote, which is what the panel is.
• Getafix
  's comment on page 30 "And the funny thing is, we still don't know what menhirs are for!" refers to the fact that modern archeologists and historians are uncertain what purpose they served.
• The "Egyptian menhir" advertised in Rome is an
  Cleopatra's Needle
  .

On Goodreads, it has a score of 4.11 out of 5.^[3]

References

• The complete guide to Asterix by Peter Kessler
  ISBN 0-340-65346-9