Doonesbury and the Art of G.B. Trudeau
*Starred Review* Trudeau began creating comic strips as a lark while at Yale in 1968, paying mischievous tribute to the university’s star quarterback Brian Dowling, hence B. D., a Doonesbury stalwart, and one of many characters based on real people. Trudeau’s clever if slapdash college strip caught the eye of an editor at an up-and-coming news syndicate, and the audacious Doonesbury (“doone” is “preppy slang for a well-meaning fool”) debuted in 1970. As his fame escalated, along with the controversies his topical strip ignited, the wizard of Doonesbury became “notoriously private.” Comics expert Walker’s disclosure of Trudeau’s artistic process, therefore, is fresh and riveting, and it is a thrill to see Trudeau’s never-before-published pencil drawings, from which Dan Carlton, Trudeau’s dedicated “inker,” has worked all these years. A comic saga like no other, Doonesbury, intelligently funny and profoundly human, is unceasing in its evolution as Trudeau explores the self, relationships, the zeitgeist, and war, from B. D.’s service in Vietnam, to nearly 250 strips about the Gulf War, and B. D.’s loss of a leg in Afghanistan. This inside look at Trudeau’s on-demand creativity, daring and caring satire, and compelling cast of more than 60 nuanced characters induces new and intensified appreciation for this phenomenal endeavor, a fun-house mirror to and intrinsic part of American culture. --Donna Seaman