Ethel & Ernest

I really admire Raymond Briggs’ work; he’s a wonderful storyteller and a fantastic artist with a great eye for colour. Ethel & Ernest is a beautiful book. The strip-cartoon format works well and makes for an intense reading experience. Whilst this book has lots of humour and light, it also features some dark topics such as the Second World War, mental illness, and bereavement. It is generally considered unsuitable for children under the age of twelve. It’s a charming love story and a vivid social record. I find it heartbreaking at times. It becomes even more touching when you remember… show more.

I was beginning my memoir when I first read Ethel & Ernest. Through richly detailed paintings and dialogue that could only have been created by the couple's son, Briggs brilliantly captures the lives of his working-class parents in their London home from the 1930s to the ‘70s. With everyday humdrum, affectionate, sometimes jokey, sometimes testy banter, they build a bulwark against the waves of history that wash up at their door. As I wrote and sketched about the life with cancer that Janet and I were forced into, Ethel & Ernest were never far from my mind. In his… show more.