Jules Feiffer
Jules Feiffer’s (1929-2025) innovative and influential comic strip began as a weekly feature in the Village Voice in 1956, exploring Cold War angst, political manipulation and suppression, the use of language as a means of thought control, civil wrongs and civil rights, Vietnam, and how all of the above affected young men and women in the search for “meaningful relationships.” Feiffer won the United States’ most prominent awards in journalism and filmmaking, taking home a 1986 Pulitzer Prize for his cartoons and a 1958 Academy Award for the short-subject cartoon “Sick, Sick, Sick: A Guide to Non-confident Munro.”
After giving up his strip after 40+ years, Feiffer went into theater and film: Little Murders, The White House Murder Case, Carnal Knowledge, Knock, Knock, Eliot Loves, Grown Ups…
Feiffer’s first foray into children’s books was to illustrate Norton Juster’s now classic The Phantom Tollbooth. His own books for children include the novels The Man in the Ceiling, A Barrel of Laughs A Vale of Tears, A Room With A Zoo, and the picture books I Lost My Bear, Meanwhile…, and Bark George (which, after a three decade delay has a sequel, Smart George). He collaborated with his daughter Kate Feiffer, Illustrating her Henry, The Dog With No Tail, By The Side Of The Road, and two others.
In recent years, he concentrated on a trilogy of noir graphic novels, beginning with Kill My Mother, and concluding in July with The Ghost Script.
He had three grown daughters, Kate, Halley, and Julie and is married to the writer, JZ Holden.
“On a personal note, let me add how amazing it was to get to know Jules over the years. He was, as you might imagine, a funny and brilliant man, full of mishegoss and angst and joy. Jules visited me and my wife at our home in Massachusetts and, over the years, welcomed us into his NYC, Martha’s Vineyard, and Sag Harbor homes, as he moved from one to the other. His studio was always delightfully disorganized. I will always remember the first time I visited his apartment and opened a closet door instead of the one leading to the bathroom. A bundle of yellowing, crumpled papers—at least 40 years old at the time– fell to the floor. I reached down and smoothed out four original Phantom Tollbooth drawings! When I showed Jules, he simply said, “Oh, that is where those are. I haven’t looked in that closet door for years.” I was beyond lucky to share many meals and birthdays with Jules and Phantom Tollbooth author Norton Juster. They loved each other like brothers and argued like brothers. For a short while they refused to speak with one another but communicated daily by telling me what they would have told the other, were they still on friendly terms.
My heart goes out to Jules’ family. A special shout out to Kate Feiffer, who inherited her Dad’s humor and talent and somehow remained “mostly” sane throughout it all.”
-Rich Michelson