Posy Simmonds

Posy Simmonds (born 1945) is the grande dame of the British comics scene – and yet she is anything but a typical comic book writer. She did not publish her first graphic novel, “Gemma Bovery”, until 1999. By then, she already had a long and highly successful career as a children’s book author, cartoonist and comic strip artist behind her.

From 1968 onwards, she initially worked as a cartoonist and illustrator for publications such as The Sun, The Times and Cosmopolitan, before joining the daily newspaper The Guardian in the mid-1970s, with which she remains associated to this day. There, from 1977, she published the daily comic strip “The Silent Three of St Botolph’s”, in which Simmonds observed the everyday lives of three middle-aged female friends and poked fun at the British middle class.

Posy Simmonds achieved her international breakthrough with three literary graphic novels centred on strong-willed women: “Gemma Bovery” (1999, published in German in 2011) is a modern adaptation of Flaubert’s “Madame Bovary”, “Tamara Drewe” (2007, published in German in 2010) draws on Thomas Hardy’s “Far from the Madding Crowd” and “Cassandra Darke” (2018, published in German in 2019) plays with references to Charles Dickens.

Simmonds’ very British humour – subtle yet biting – also runs through her graphic novels: she unerringly mocks the shortcomings, dreams and pitifulness of the middle class, the art world’s elite and social media celebrities; she exposes mediocrity, hypocrisy, greed and self-deception; and she caricatures current social trends. The psychological sophistication of her characterisation is striking. With elegant and expressive pen strokes, she subtly exaggerates her characters, capturing their facial expressions and body language so precisely that we learn more about them than they would care to reveal.

It is also impressive how skilfully Posy Simmonds interweaves large ensembles of characters, multiple narrative perspectives and, in certain cases, different time frames. To do justice to the complexity of the story and its characters, Simmonds combines text and image in a way that differs from the classic comic: she inserts narrative text passages between sequences of images; alongside dialogues and monologues, she also works with emails and text messages and incorporates newspaper articles and websites.

With her graphic novels, Posy Simmonds has expanded the scope and subtlety of the graphic novel and established herself as one of the most modern and sophisticated contemporary comic book authors. (Christian Gasser)

Comics in German (selection):

– Tamara Drewe (Translation: Uli Pröfrock). Reprodukt, Berlin 2010
– Gemma Bovery (Translation: Annette von der Weppen). Reprodukt, Berlin 2011
– Cassandra Darke (Translation: Sven Scheer). Reprodukt, Berlin 2019
– Fred (new edition; Translation: Annette von der Weppen). Reprodukt. Berlin, July 2026

Children‘s books in German (selection):

– Lulu und die fliegenden Babys (Translation: Erica Ruetz). Diogenes, Zurich 1990
– Schokoladenhochzeit (Translation: Erica Ruetz). Diogenes, Zurich 1991
– Fred (Translation: Christina Diaz). Diogenes, Zurich 1994
– Polly, Jack und der Büffel (Translation: Erica Ruetz). Diogenes, Zurich 1996
– Das Bibber-ABC (Translation: Erica Ruetz und Winfried Stephan). Diogenes, Zurich 1997
– Die Katze des Bäckers (Translation: Erica Ruetz). Diogenes, Zurich 2004

Prices and awards (selection):

1980 – Cartoonist of the Year
1982 – Cartoonist of the Year
1998 – National Art Library Illustration Award
2002 – Appointment as a Member of the British Empire
2009 – Prix de la critique du festival d'Angoulême for “Tamara Drewe”
2024 – Grand Prix de la Ville d’Angoulême for her lifetime achievement
2026 – Max und Moritz Lifetime Achievement Award