Asterix and the Cauldron was published in 1969.
I probably read this story once when I was a child but reading it again I couldn’t recall any of it which is a good thing. It was like reading a new Asterix story!
This story is pretty entertaining and the story goes like this...
The Chief Whosemoralsarelastix who lives in the village of the cliff tops has brought a cauldron full of sesterii (coins) to the village of Chief Vitalstatisix. Since Chief Whosemoralsarelastix doesn’t want to pay the high taxes that the Romans demand, he want to leave the coins for some time in Chief Vitalstatisix’s village since these Gauls do not pay taxes.
Chief Vitalstatisix agrees to leave the coins in his village and Asterix is put in charge of guarding the cauldron and sesterii. The next day, all of the coins have disappeared! Because of Asterix’s carelessness of letting the dough disappear, he’s banished from the village.
There is one way of Asterix being able to return to his village and that is to repay Chief Whosemoralsarelastix. Obelix tags along on the journey and they both try many things to earn money.
As I said above, this story is very entertaining because emotionally we’re worried about Asterix. He weeps and bawls after being banished from the village and we get to see a very different side of Asterix.
The story’s structure is pretty simple and we have Asterix and Obelix trying and failing at various jobs. They try to sell boars but they have no ideas about pricing. Obelix tries to train Dogmatix to do tricks for money. They become gladiators. Obelix does some acting, etcetera.
All of these situations are structured well in the story (not too long, not too short) so everything moves along well.
My personal favorite part is when Obelix tries to become and actor. Obelix’s stage-fright is awfully funny but it’s the egotistical Laurensolivius that made me laugh (this character recruits A and O) since I’ve met people like this in my lifetime.
Asterix breaking into a bank and doing something is a little bit un-Asterix-like... I guess R. Goscinny had to fill in a couple of more pages in the story.
For children who read this book, they might start thinking more about what kind of work they might want to do in the future.
