About Tomi Ungerer

Much of Tomi Ungerer’s work was concerned with politics and erotica but I’ll remember him best for his children’s books, such as his illustrations for Jeff Brown’s Flat Stanley and above all The Beast of Monsieur Racine. I’ve only just discovered that there’s a film of the latter, which brilliantly captures the book’s lurches from sweet melancholy to deeply weird grotesquerie. RIP.



PS: I’ve also suddenly remembered the time I was co-opted into doing some decorations for my university summer ball, which had a Summer of Love theme. “Do something Sixties-ish,” I was told. I knocked off a fairly gauche copy of one of Ungerer’s Vietnam posters. They didn’t ask me back.