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Loriot and his bulbous-nosed characters

(© © picture-alliance / Sven Simon)

The legendary German humorist Loriot, famous for his endearing bulbous-nosed characers and the animated cartoon dog Wum, has turned 85.

His dry wit, including wicked wordplays and a crafty sense of the comical, has left an indelible imprint on the German language.

To merely call him a "humorist", however, fails to do justice to his many skills and talents. He is also a draughtsman, author, stage designer, actor, director and professor. He has written a host of sketches and television programs, which he also often directed himself, designed the sets for and played the lead role in.

The Film and Television Museum in Berlin is celebrating his life's work in the largest exhibition ever dedicated to all things Loriot. "In his work," the museum suggests, "especially in his work for television, the singular achievements of a great artist collide with the everyday culture of the Federal Republic of Germany and the biographies of its citizens."

Bernhard Victor (Vicco) Christoph Carl von Bülow, the "grand seigneur of German humor", was born on November 12, 1923 in Brandenburg an der Havel in the eastern German state of Brandenburg and published his first cartoons in the 1950s under the pseudonym "Loriot". This is French for the oriole songbird, the heraldic animal on his family coat of arms. It was as Loriot that he became famous in Germany for his unique brand of humor and even today many people do not know his real name.

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(© picture-alliance/ dpa)

In his sketches and cartoon films depicting family life and everyday incidents, Loriot takes issue with the human inability to communicate, which perennially gives rise to misunderstandings, conflicts and comic situations. As an astute observer of human nature, he points out the absurd side of the situations we encounter every day.

The endearing bulbous-nosed characters that people Loriot's cartoons appeared early on, in his first solo book of cartoons published in 1954 by the Swiss Diogenes Verlag (Auf den Hund gekommen).

Another one of his most endearing creations was the animated cartoon dog Wum, who achieved television fame in 1971 as the mascot of Aktion Sorgenkind, a campaign to raise money for children with disabilities. Wum spoke with Loriot's own voice and in 1972 Wum's song Ich wünsch' mir 'ne kleine Miezekatze (I wish I had a little kitty cat) even made it to the top of the German hit parade.

In the course of his long career this man of many talents has won numerous awards, including the Golden Camera, the Bavarian Film Prize (Bambi Award) and the Wilhelm Busch Prize. In 2004 he received the Jacob Grimme German Language Prize, one of Germany's most prestigious language awards.

Loriot retired from public life in 2006, but his inimitable, dry humor remains as irresistible as ever. His gift for coining new words or imbuing old ones with new meaning have enriched the German language in a host of different ways.

Loriot, official homepage (in German)

Loriot Lexikon (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, in German)

Loriot (and Loriot-related!) videos You Tube