Astérix & Obélix’s Birthday: The Golden Book
By René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo, translated by Anthea Bell
Orion £10.99, 56 pages
FT Bookshop price: £8.79

Housing estates have driven out the wild boar, Obélix is eating chickpeas, while climate change, MRI scans and the Imperiovision song contest have all made a mark. Despite a few changes, however, life remains much the same for Astérix the Gaul and his friends, 50 years after the comic book characters were created.

The cast of personalities dreamt up by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo still holds out against its Roman invaders and even on this their 50th birthday, Julius Caesar can’t resist trying to trick the Gauls.

Since Uderzo died in 1977, the books have been less polished but Goscinny’s drawings are as brilliant as ever and the packed pages of this 50th anniversary volume will delight devotees. This isn’t the book to hook newcomers but the rest of us will be delighted that the sky hasn’t yet fallen on the heads of the indomitable Gauls.