David B.David B.

Artist, writer, editor, designer, the prolific David B. was born in Nîmes, France, in 1959. He is a key figure of the 1990s alternative movement that transformed contemporary French comics, and one of the seven founding members of L'Association. A lifelong fan of the fantastic, he is as known for his original work, which draws on folklore and mythology (The Armed Garden [Fantagraphics, 2011], Incidents of the Night [Uncivilized Books, forthcoming], as for his surreal dream journals (Le Cheval blême [L’Association, 1992], Nocturnal Conspiracies [NBM, 2008, trans. Joe Johnson]). His books also feature famous and forgotten fabulists: The Littlest Pirate King [Fantagraphics, 2010], adapted from a story by Pierre Mac Orlan, and in collaboration with Emmanuel Guibert, the superlative Le Capitaine Écarlate [Dupuis, 2000], which makes Borges forerunner Marcel Schwob into a figure of his own fantasies.

His most celebrated work remains the memoir L’Ascension du haut mal. Published in 6 volumes from 1996-2003, this autobiography of his imaginative development intertwines the stories of the author’s artistic growth and his difficult childhood, with his brother Jean-Christophe’s epilepsy and his family’s search for an effective treatment. In 2005, it was published in a single volume by Pantheon Books as Epileptic, in a translation by Kim Thompson.

His recent output has been marked by collaborations with such noted artists as Joann Sfar, Christophe Blain, and Hugues Micol, and nonfiction, including Black Paths [Self Made Hero, 2011, trans. Nora Mahony], his biography of Italian poet Gabriele d'Annunzio, and Best of Enemies [Self Made Hero, 2011, trans. Nora Mahony], a history of U.S.-Middle Eastern relations in collaboration with historian Jean-Pierre Filiu.

In 2007, Words Without Borders featured an excerpt from his 1991 short comic A Bomb in the Family, also translated by Edward Gauvin.

» More by this author

Hervé TanquerelleHervé Tanquerelle

Born in 1972, Nantes native Hervé Tanquerelle is a bright artistic talent of the current French comics scene. Right from his first book, The Ballad of the Little Hanged Man [L’Association, 1998], to his forthcoming work, a “spaghetti epic” from Dargaud (written by Appollo), he has not stopped experimenting with new approaches to art and storytelling. After collaborating with Hubert on the series The Alchemist’s Legacy, he took up drawing duties on Joann Sfar’s series Professor Bell (Delcourt). His style is one of constant transformation, in settings that range from lucha libre (with the children’s comic Cabeza Negra in Cosmic Capsule magazine) to reportage (The Commune, a diptych with his father-in-law Yann Benoît, from Futuropolis), from thrillers to literary adaptations (Jørn Riel’s Arctic Yarns series, with Gwen de Bonneval). Tanquerelle is the editor-in-chief of the new digital comics revue Professor CYCLOPS.

» More by this author

» More by this translator