Briggs is a very famous British children's author, which I didn't realize until after I finished reading this graphic novel. It didn't surprise me though, because the rich illustrations reminded me of books I'd read as a child. They were fabulous! A tribute to his parents, this is their love story. Nos encontramos ante una especie de biografía en forma de homenaje del autor hacia sus padres. En ella nos relata su vida familiar desde que se conocen hasta que fallecen, donde iremos viendo el paso del tiempo, los progresos, las diferencias entre ambos, etc.

As various narrative texts came his way, he realised that not all of them were of the highest quality, and took to writing himself. In 1961 he wrote and illustrated two books, Midnight Adventure and The Strange House, for the publishers Hamish Hamilton, with whom he would have a lasting working relationship. Briggs admits it was a difficult book to write, particularly the parts that depicted the deaths of his parents in hospital.This is a great, whimsical character study of a common married couple as well as an excellent social study of British working-class morals and beliefs in the twentieth century. He contends: "There's never been a book like it. It's a perfect book because it's so expressive, it's the sort of book that moves you to tears because it's so intense but so simple, in the same Raymond way. It has deadpan, offbeat humour, but he is depicting those two people he loved so dearly. It's one of the most moving books I've ever read." She says: "I think he makes it real because it's set in domesticity. It's the tiny little details, even when awful things are happening to them. When Jim is bleeding Hilary says, 'Oh no, on your nice shirt'. The mundane details make it very real and very touching. He's wonderful at dialogue." He was born in Wimbledon, south-west London, to Ethel (nee Bowyer) and Ernest Briggs. Their first meeting is beautifully described in the wordless opening sequence of the book devoted to their story. Ethel, a young parlour maid in a Belgravia house, had been innocently shaking out her duster from an upper window as Ernest passed by on his bicycle and confidently returned what he took to be a friendly wave. El ilustrador Raymond Briggs hace un homenaje gráfico a la relación de sus padres y cuenta la historia del matrimonio desde que se conocen hasta el fallecimiento de ambos. Y, mientras tanto, sucede el siglo XX. Ethel y Ernest es un retrato personal, sí, pero también lo es de una clase social: la de los ingleses de clase trabajadora que experimentaron las penurias de dos guerras mundiales y sus consecuencias. Entre tazas de té nos narran los avances de la sociedad y, con un humor muy británico, ironizan sobre la modernidad, las revoluciones sociales y los inventos que fueron llegando a los hogares para hacer las vidas más fáciles. En esta historia también se habla mucho sobre la paternidad: sobre volcar las ilusiones en los hijos y que después sus sueños sean distintos a lo que se proyectó para ellos, sobre crecer posicionándose en contra de todo lo que se mamó.

Life gets pretty basic. Based during the Nazi times of ww2, this graphic novel is pretty impressive! Reminds me of the movie Up at times. Ethel e Ernest è un fumetto che sa di casa in ogni pagina; si possono sentire le risate, le discussioni, i rumori dei lavori, il profumo del cibo, l’acqua che scorre, le risate di un bambino.Poignant, funny, and utterly original, Ethel and u0026 Ernest is Raymond Briggs’s loving depiction of his parents’ lives from their chance first encounter in the 1920s until their deaths in the 1970s.Ethel and Ernest were solid members of the English working class, part of the generation that lived through the most tumultuous years of the twentieth century. They met during the Depression — she working as a maid, he as a milkman — and we follow them as they court and marry, make a home, raise their son, and cope with the dark days of World War II. Briggs’s portrayal of how his parents succeeded, or failed, in coming to terms with the events of their rapidly shifting world — the advent of radio, television, and telephones; the development of the atomic bomb; the moon landing; the social and political turmoil of the sixties — is irresistibly engaging, full of sympathy and affection, yet clear-eyed and unsentimental.Briggs’s illustrations are small masterpieces; coupled with the wonderfully candid dialogue, they evoke the exhilaration and sorrow, excitement and bewilderment, of experiencing such enormous changes. As much a social history as a personal account, Ethel and u0026 Ernest is a moving tribute to ordinary people living in an extraordinary time. Ethel and Ernest by Raymond Briggs – eBook Details But perhaps the most powerful motivation was a hatred of injustice by authority toward the powerless and naively respectful common man. The latter could be seen most directly in When the Wind Blows (1982), Briggs’s examination of an elderly couple’s attempts to follow government guidelines as nuclear war breaks out; and The Tin-Pot General and the Old Iron Woman (1984), a thinly disguised General Leopoldo Galtieri and Margaret Thatcher. This story is a memoir of Raymond Briggs' parents living their lives in an extraordinary time. What I enjoyed about this was that it was VERY British (which of course connected with me) and that they felt so 'normal'. This couple isn't famous or wealthy or anything too out of the ordinary, they just have to keep on getting by whilst the wars happen and technology changes and politics shifts all around them. They kind of represent most British people's grandparents I would imagine, or maybe even great-grandparents. They just got on with it, and made it work - they didn't have a choice...

On the other hand, I loved Ernest - he was a passionate man who liked to rub his wife up the wrong way at times, just to see her reaction. He always knew where he came from and in this respect, he was a completely grounded character who warmed my heart.stato un fumetto che ho amato fin dall’inizio. Sono stata catapultata in un’altra vita, un’altra epoca, e percepivo il cambiamento a ogni decennio. Ho provato molte emozioni diverse: mi sono divertita, mi sono affezionata a questa dolce e simpatica coppia, ho avuto paura con loro e per loro, e mi sono sentita terribilmente triste, quasi svuotata, quando tutto è finito. I cannot give a proper review for this book and I will leave the plot empty because if I write anymore I will spoiled this short book for you. I find it interesting how different each decade appears in this book and how easily our opinions changes during our life. For Example, when Hitler first came into power, Raymond parents didn't find him horrible and liked him. But immediately when he started invading Europe and sending Jews to death camps, they realize that he needs to be stopped or he can conquer and destroy England. We also get to see Ethel and Ernest's reaction to the invention of the television and how it feels like being inside a movie theater in your own home. The story takes place in London, England from the 1920s through 1971. We meet Ethel who is a maid who one day she sees a man from the window who is riding a bike. He waves at her and she blushes that a man is paying attention to her. He tells her that his name is Ernest and then asks her out to go watch a movie. After that encounter they become a couple and soon enough they get married. She quits her job and becomes a house wife while Ernest works as a milkman. We enter the 1930s and the times are rough during these period because of high unemployment, recuperating from WWI, and economic depression. En apenas 120 páginas, el autor nos hace cogerle un cariño especial a esta peculiar pareja. Al principio me estaba pareciendo una historia corriente, pero gana muchísimo en su segunda mitad; con la II Guerra Mundial terminada, ha logrado hacerme reír mucho, a carcajadas en algunos momentos, y eso en un libro y en mi caso es poco corriente. Ingrams says: "Ethel & Ernest is supposed to be a book about his parents. But it's really more of an autobiography of himself. He is the central character in it. You get the importance that he attaches to the world he was brought up in, the world of his parents, is a completely different world to the one people live in now."