Casterman is a publisher of
Franco-Belgian comics, specializing in
comic books
A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are oft ...
and
children's literature
Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader.
Children's ...
. The company is based in
Brussels
Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...
, Belgium.
History
The company was founded in 1780 by
Donat-Joseph Casterman, an editor and bookseller originally from Tournai.
[Bocquet, José-Louis, and Fromental, Jean-Luc. ''The Adventures of Hergé'' (Drawn and Quarterly, 2011).] Casterman was originally a printing company and
publishing house. In 1934, Casterman took over the ''
Le Petit Vingtième'' editions for the publication of the albums of ''
The Adventures of Tintin
''The Adventures of Tintin'' (french: Les Aventures de Tintin ) is a series of 24 bande dessinée#Formats, ''bande dessinée'' albums created by Belgians, Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, who wrote under the pen name Hergé. The series was one ...
'', from the fourth album of the series, ''
Cigars of the Pharaoh''. From 1942, Casterman published reworked versions and colored versions of the previous Tintin albums.
Strengthened by the success of
Hergé's comics, shortly after, Casterman proposed new series with new authors such as
Jacques Martin,
François Craenhals and
C. & V. Hansen. From 1954 on, Casterman published children's books, as well, including the successful ''
Martine'' books by
Marcel Marlier
Marcel Marlier (18 November 1930 – 18 January 2011) was a Belgian artist and illustrator. He was born in Herseaux, Belgium. When he was 16, he enrolled in decorative art at Saint-Luc de Tournai. He finished his studies in 1951 with the great ...
and the
Cadet- Rama books written by
Alain Gree (units
Achille et Bergamote and
Petit Tom).
Keen to appeal to a more mature market, Casterman decided in 1973 to publish the first albums of ''
Corto Maltese'' by the
Italian author
Hugo Pratt. Furthermore, in 1978, Casterman established its monthly magazine ''
A Suivre
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes ...
'', which was to influence the comics revival of the 1980s. Casterman ceased the publication of ''A Suivre'' in 1997.
Casterman is now part of
Groupe Flammarion.
Casterman's
manga
Manga ( Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is ...
series are published under the imprint
Sakka.
References
External links
*
Book publishing companies of Belgium
Comic book publishing companies of Belgium
Tintin
Belgian brands
Companies established in 1780
Publishing companies established in the 1780s
Tournai
Companies based in Hainaut (province)
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