Paul Deliège

Paul, or "Pol" Deliège was a popular artist/writer of Spirou magazine from the 1960s to the 1990s. He was an important member of the so-called "École de Charleroi", along with artists like Peyo and Roba. He began his career in the Belgian daily Le Soir with 'Félicien et les Romanis' and 'Le Père Bricole'. He joined Dupuis' art studios in 1959, which paved the way to Spirou. A year later, Deliège launched the 'Théophile et Philibert' series.

The series lasted for three episodes, the last two written by Vicq. He then became one of the main artists of Spirou's "mini-books" section. There, he launched several recurring characters, such as 'Sosthène', 'Bobo' (both written by Maurice Rosy), 'Cabanon' and 'Superdingue'. He also wrote for other artists, such as 'Sam' for Lagas, and 'Petit-Cactus' for Salvérius.

The micro-story character 'Bobo' became the highlight of Deliège's career. Also taking on the writing duties, Deliège continued the adventures of this Inzepocket prisoner in Spirou's "normal pages" from 1966. Deliège teamed up with fellow artist Arthur Piroton in 1968 to create 'Les Krostons'. Deliège and Piroton drew the first episode of this series under the collective pseudonym of Max Ariane. 'Les Krostons', about three small creatures determined to rule the world after coming to life from an artist's drawingboard, was continued solely by Deliège until 1983.

On the side, Deliège wrote some episodes of Raymond Macherot's 'Sibylline' in the 1970s, and drew a series of strips called 'Le Trou du Souffleur' in the late 1980s. Paul continued 'Bobo' until his retirement in 1996, setting his prisoner free in the final episode in Spirou issue 3057.

Several years after retiring from an admirable comics career, Paul Deliège died on 7 July 2005 at the age of 74.