Goscinny

Rene Goscinny was a French comics writer and editor best known for the Asterix comic series that he produced together with Albert Uderzo. Goscinny was born in Paris to Polish Jewish immigrants in 1926, the second born child of Stanislaw Goscinny, and Bereśniak-Gościnna. His parents moved to Buenos Aires, Argentina when Goscinny was aged two, as his father a chemical engineer, had been called up to take a lucrative post there. His childhood in Argentina can be said to have been a happy one, given that despite his shyness he was much beloved as a class clown. Attending some of the best French schools in Buenos Aires, he started drawing at a very early age, drawing inspiration from the illustrated stories he found in the library. The tranquil lifestyle was not to last long as his father died from a cerebral hemorrhage when Goscinny was 17, forcing him to look for a job to support himself. He was soon hired as an accountant assistant in 1944 before he was laid off and ended up as an illustrator for an advertising agency. He did not stay long at the agency as the next year he moved to New York with his mother before moving on to France where he was recruited into the French army. He would serve as the appointed artist of the 141st Alpine Infantry battalion for a year, before he quit to pursue personal interests.