Marten Toonder (1912-2005) was first introduced to comics at the young age of six, when his father, a sea captain, brought back some American newspapers. After graduating in 1931, Toonder traveled by boat to South America. In Buenos Aires, he discovered the work of cartoonist Dante Quinterno. This former employee of Walt Disney published a written drawing course; it was from him that Toonder learned the foundations of animation and comic anatomy, inspiring him to become a comic artist.
Upon his return to the Netherlands, Toonder became an illustrator for a printing and publishing company in Leiden. After several attempts at creating comics for newspapers, he got his first break in 1941 when he was asked to supply a daily comic to De Telegraaf. The editor at the time wanted captions with the drawings (instead of balloons, which would encourage laziness in reading), and Toonder provided illustrations and texts for his new comic, Tom Poes. Toonder stopped in 1944 but continued the story in the Volkskrant and later NRC Handelsblad. He continued to create new episodes until 1986, with a total of 177 stories covering 11,768 daily installments. The comic became one of the longest-running comics by a single author.
The success of Tom Poes paved the way for various other productions, including plays, ballets, compositions, films, and a wide range of commercial articles. To bring these to fruition, Toonder continued to run the studio he established during the war. In the post-war years, this studio grew to become one of Europe’s largest drawing studios. However, with increasing business activities encroaching upon his creative work, Toonder made the decision to move to Ireland in 1965 to devote himself to his comic strip. In addition to Tom Poes, he also designed other comic strips, wrote poetry, autobiographies, and created illustrations for various purposes. He even produced short experimental films using different techniques.
www.ftn-books.com has several Toonder titles available. among them the much acclaimed biography on Toonder.
