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Gaston : the character  
 

Gaston Lagaffe, "the hero without a job" is employed at the Journal de Spirou office where he does many thing excepting his work. He appeared in Spirou’s comic strip (n° 985) in 1957, the 28 of february. he came wandering in one week, claiming to be the magazine's big hero.

Gaston is lazy and an occasional blunderer, finding a way to set fire to the fire extinguishers, or flooding the office, for example. He spends the majority of his time trying to avoid work by hiding in a closet, or even by just simply sleeping on the job…
His gaffes gave him his surname.

But the character is also resourcefulth : he invents gadgets in order to make work that much easier. He is a musician - I may say he thinks he is musician. He has created some rather fantastic musical instruments, the most important of which is the "gaffophone". He also plays (awfully), among others, the guitar, the tuba, the trombone, and the car horn organ.

Gaston has a passion for ecology and adores his little animals : a hyperactive cat, a seagull, a goldfish, and several mice. But, because his apartment is too small, he must keep all of his animals at the office. This becomes more annoying when he brings in a cow or a pig that he won in a contest, especially when the animal tries to eat Gaston’s colleagues’ important papers…

A born tinkerer, it sometimes takes courage to continue driving his "Gaffomobile" jalopy, a 1928 Fiat 509 decorated with a “sporty” checkerboard pattern.

Mad inventor, researcher, handyman, music lover, foodie... Gaston’s talents and qualities grow over time to slowly reveal a generous, sensitive and ingenious man whose creativity knows no bounds. Gaston, then, is in fact Franquin’s alter ego, a fictionalised but revealing self portrait.

Gaston superstar

Gaston Lagaffe is known all around the world. His stories are traduced in more than 15 languages : german, swedish, Italian, finnish, icelandic, and even in esperanto… And he isn’t called Gaston in all this countries : in spain Gaston is tomas elgafe, in norwege Viggo

German : Gaston
Swedish : Gaston
Italian : Gastone

Dannish : Vakse Viggo

Finnish : Niilo Pielinen
Greek : Sergi Grapes
Spannish : Tomás Elgafe
Norwegian : Viggo
Icelandic : Viggó Vidutan

Dutch : Guust Flater