Trudeau & Doonesbury- A Biography.jpg
Trudeau & Doonesbury- A Biography.jpg

Trudeau & Doonesbury by Joshua Kendall

from $13.99
Hardcover:

The definitive account of the life and work of Garry Trudeau, creator of the massively popular Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoon Doonesbury, based on archival sources and original interviews, including with Trudeau himself, and lavishly illustrated with over 200 cartoons and images.

“Well-reported and -researched.”―Walter Isaacson, New York Times bestselling author of Steve Jobs and Elon Musk

Rent new hardcover on Trove: $13.99 - Each rental copy can be rented for 30 days. If you love the book and decide to keep it, the remaining balance applies. More information below.

Buy new hardcover on Trove: $35.00

____________________________________________

About the book:

Joshua Kendall's biography of Garry Trudeau, the creator of Doonesbury, draws on original interviews and rare access to trace Trudeau's path from an Adirondacks boyhood through Yale, where the strip that would reshape American political cartooning first took shape.

Built around more than 200 illustrations reproduced in full color, the book traces five decades of Doonesbury's collisions with war, politics, and scandal, and makes the case for Trudeau as one of the most consequential satirists in American history.

Kendall, known for his biographies of Noah Webster and Peter Mark Roget, brings the same rigor and narrative drive to Trudeau, placing his life and work within the larger story of American satire.

Trudeau & Doonesbury is both a definitive biography and a visual history—an essential book for anyone who grew up reading the strip or wants to understand how one cartoonist changed the national conversation.

The definitive account of the life and work of Garry Trudeau, creator of the massively popular Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoon Doonesbury, based on archival sources and original interviews, including with Trudeau himself, and lavishly illustrated with over 200 cartoons and images.

“Well-reported and -researched.”―Walter Isaacson, New York Times bestselling author of Steve Jobs and Elon Musk

Rent new hardcover on Trove: $13.99 - Each rental copy can be rented for 30 days. If you love the book and decide to keep it, the remaining balance applies. More information below.

Buy new hardcover on Trove: $35.00

____________________________________________

About the book:

Joshua Kendall's biography of Garry Trudeau, the creator of Doonesbury, draws on original interviews and rare access to trace Trudeau's path from an Adirondacks boyhood through Yale, where the strip that would reshape American political cartooning first took shape.

Built around more than 200 illustrations reproduced in full color, the book traces five decades of Doonesbury's collisions with war, politics, and scandal, and makes the case for Trudeau as one of the most consequential satirists in American history.

Kendall, known for his biographies of Noah Webster and Peter Mark Roget, brings the same rigor and narrative drive to Trudeau, placing his life and work within the larger story of American satire.

Trudeau & Doonesbury is both a definitive biography and a visual history—an essential book for anyone who grew up reading the strip or wants to understand how one cartoonist changed the national conversation.

  • Publisher: Harry N. Abrams

    Title: Trudeau & Doonesbury: A Biography

    Author: Joshua Kendall

    On Sale Date: July 7, 2026

    ISBN-13: 9781419776113

    ISBN-10: 1419776118

    Format: Hardcover

    Retail Price: $35.00 USD

    BISAC: Biography & Autobiography / Entertainment & Performing Arts

    Page Count: 352

    Dimensions: 9.4 in H | 7 in W | 1.5 in T

    Weight: 2.2 lb

  • Joshua Kendall is an award-winning journalist and biographer whose work focuses on the hidden lives behind American cultural institutions. He is the author of The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture, The Man Who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget's Thesaurus, and America's Obsessives: The Compulsive Energy That Built a Nation.

    A former Boston Globe correspondent, his writing has also appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Atlantic. He lives in the Boston area.

  • Readers are calling it revelatory, nostalgic, and sharply observed:

    • Early readers describe Trudeau & Doonesbury as a revelatory look behind the strip that shaped decades of political commentary.

    • Reviewers are praising Kendall's access to Garry Trudeau himself as a rare and illuminating window into a notoriously private artist.

    • Longtime fans call the book a nostalgic trip through fifty years of American politics as seen through Doonesbury's satirical lens.

    • Critics highlight the more than 200 full-color cartoons as reason enough to own the book, calling it as much a visual history as a biography.

This book is for you if:

  • You grew up reading Doonesbury or want to understand why it mattered.

  • You love political and social satire with real historical bite.

  • You enjoy definitive biographies of major cultural and creative figures.

  • You want a beautifully illustrated book with 200+ full-color cartoons.

  • You appreciate stories about the power of a single voice to shape national conversation.

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