The World of Pont

(Nadder Books 1983)
ISBN 0-90654-038-0

Graham Laidler trained as an architect but became a cartoonist due to ill-health (a tubercular kidney). From 1932 until his death in 1940, aged 32, he travelled the world and drew funny pictures, mostly of The English both at home and abroad, under exclusive contract to Punch – a hitherto unique arrangement.

His humorous observations were simultaneously incisive and gentle, baroque and subtle. His work was collected into a number of books during his lifetime and since, and his influence as humorist and draughtsman can still be felt.

He mastered telling a complete story in a single drawing although he also worked in the strip cartoon format for The Women’s Pictorial. His cartoons exemplified the British to the world at large. The Nazis, with typical sinister efficiency, used his drawings as the basis of their anti-British propaganda when they invaded Holland, further confirming to the world the belief that Germans Have No Sense of Humour.

As “Pont”, and for eight too-brief years, Graham Laidler became an icon of English life, and you would be doing yourself an immense favour in tracking down his work. If you like Ealing comedies, Alistair Sim or Margaret Rutherford, St Trinians and the Molesworth books, or the works of Thelwell or Ronald Searle, you won’t regret the search.

If you love good drawing and sharp observational wit you’ll thank me. If you just want a damn good laugh, you’ll reward yourself with the assorted works of Pont.

Unbelievably, despite his woefully small output (around 400 cartoons) there doesn’t seem to be a definitive collection of the work of Pont. If there’s a publisher reading this I pray you take the hint. For the rest of us there’s the thrill of the hunt and the promised bounty in seeking out “The British Character”, “The British at Home”, “The British Carry On”, “Most of us are Absurd”, “Pont” and “The World of Pont”.

© 1983, 2007 the estate of Graham Laidler.