The Adventures of Tintin: "Tintin and the Castafiore Emerald": The original comic book of Tintin by Herge, Series 21.

"Tintin and 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 Comics magazine.

This comics book was considered by critics to be an antithesis of the previous Tintin comics 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, Captain Haddock's family estate in the fictional town of Marlinshire, England, 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.

While Captain Haddock and Tintin are walking through the country when they encounter a Roma community camping in a landfill area. The two query them and after discovering that the community only chose the landfill area was only due to them being prohibited by the local police to use any other location in the area. Captain Haddock invites them to use the grounds of his estate, Marlinspike Hall, despite the doubts of his butler Nestor. Not long after that, Bianca Castafiore, the famous opera, chose to invite herself to Marlinspike for a holiday, much to Haddock’s dismay. For some time prior to this, one of the marble steps in the foyer in Marlinspike Hall has had a dangerous plate-sized chip missing. Nestor has arranged its repair, but has been waiting for the repairman to arrive. When he contacted the repairman Mr. Bolt he had merely fobbed Haddock off.Upon learning of Castafiore's imminent visit, Haddock hurries to pack for a trip to Italy, believing that now would be a good time to visit, because he had always avoided visiting the country in the past, specifically to avoid her. In his rush, Haddock misses the broken step, which, just moments before, he had been conceitedly warning Nestor and others about. He sprains his ankle as a consequence. A doctor arrives to examine the Captain and insists that the foot and ankle must be encased in a cast and imposing at least of a fortnight's bed rest. As a result, the Captain has to use a wheelchair for a majority of the book’s remainder. The broken step then becomes a continuing source of comic relief for the rest of the story, and every main character, with the exception of Castafiore herself, slips and falls down the step at least and a parrot, as a gift for the Captain, called "Iago." Just like the parrots encountered in Red Rackham's Treasure, the bird manages to pick up some of the Haddock’s slang, much to the Captain's annoyance.
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The Characters in this Tintin series:
Tintin
Snowy
Captain Haddock
Cuthbert Calculus
Thompson and Thomson
Bianca Castafiore
Irma
Igor Wagner
Jolyon Wagg
Nestor
Mike
Miarka
Christopher Willoughby-Drupe
Marco Rizotto
Mr. Bolt
Mrs. Bolt
Iago
Andy
Chang Chong-Chen
Captain Chester
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'Hergé' was born Georges Remi on 22 May, 1907 in Etterbeek, a suburb of Brussels, in Belgium. After leaving school, he worked for the daily newspaper, Le Siècle (The 20th Century). He was responsibe the for the section of the newspaper designed for children comics. Tintin, the main character in his works, was introduced on January 10, 1929 in a story entitled 'Tintin in the Land of the Soviets.' Each story ran as a comic strip in the magazine version and then was published as a book. Some of these books were adapted for the small screen including The Crab With The Golden Claws, Star of Mystery, Red Rakham's Treasure, Black Island, Objective Moon and The Calculus Affair. French TV produced longer versions of twenty of the books in 1992, which have been broadcast in over fifty countries. On 3 March, 1983, he died in Brussels. At the time of his death, he was working on Tintin and the Alpha-Art, which was published.