Colonel Sponsz
Surname: Sponsz(*)
(*) In Marollien (A Dutch dialect exclusive to Brussels): the name means, sponge.
First name: Unknown
Occupation: Chief of the Bordurian Secret Police, ZEP / technical adviser to Tapioca
(*) In Marollien (A Dutch dialect exclusive to Brussels): the name means, sponge.
First name: Unknown
Occupation: Chief of the Bordurian Secret Police, ZEP / technical adviser to Tapioca
Graphically inspired by Hergé's own brother, the Bordurian Colonel is the perfect example of an evil man with no conscience.
For a hero as exceptional as Tintin, there need to be villains of equal stature. And Colonel Sponsz, Chief of the Bordurian Secret Police (The Calculus Affair), clearly falls into the category of dark geniuses.
Sponsz is a Tintin who has turned to the Dark Side. But the two men never lost sight of each other. And in The Calculus Affair, in 1956, Hergé, as he confided to Numa Sadoul, used his brother's head posture and tonsure to portray the detestable Sponsz.
Hergé also confided that the character, ‘obviously German’, was inspired by Erich von Stroheim. The actor and director was in fact of Austro-Hungarian origin, but it was obviously in the role of the Commander with the neck brace in La Grande Illusion, directed by Jean Renoir in 1937, that he made the greatest impact on the collective unconscious.
Always impeccably dressed with a perfect tonsure, Colonel Sponsz was a keen student of his classical culture and frequents the opera. We see him again in Tintin and the Picaros, where he has become Tapioca's technical adviser.
