Obelix & Co

This is a brilliant book at many levels and can be enjoyed not only for its classic Asterix humor and puns, but also as a clever satire on modern economies and hype driven marketing.

Fed up with the sacking of the fortified Roman camp of Totorum by the Indomitable Gauls in honor of Obelix’s birthday, Julius Caeser dispatches Caius Preposterus, a hotshot young graduate of the Latin School of Economics, to corrupt the Gauls with gold. The profit motive, as Caius explains, will enfeeble them and keep them busy, and as proof, he points out the example of the fat, corrupt, senators of Rome. With the Roman treasury behind him, Caius befriends Obelix and starts buying menhirs for handsome (and artificially inflated) prices and starts to convert the Gauls’ barter economy to a money based one, enriching most of the Gaulish villagers, except Asterix and the Druid Getafix, who refuse to be taken in. The villagers, busy trading, stop fighting the Romans and leave them in peace. It looks like Julius Caesar is going to control all of Gaul, after all.

However, seeing the enormous prices obtainable for the next-to-worthless menhirs, other nationalities (the Egyptians, Phoenicians) jump into the menhir trade, creating an artificial bubble for a product that does not have any intrinsic value and is purely driven by hype. In the meanwhile, the native Roman traders, upset at being left out, lobby for protectionist economic policies and “keeping out the foreigners”, threatening to derail Julius Caesar’s Gaulish conquest plans.

As is inevitable, the market for menhirs eventually comes crashing down, depleting the Roman treasury and forcing a devaluation of the Roman Sestertius. Our hotshot grad of the Latin School of Economics seriously falls out of Caesar’s favor and everything ends happily with the Gauls going back to their old ways.

Incidentally, is there anyone that has not read an Asterix comic? Please accept my condolences on a very misspent life.