Interview With Brazen Author Pénélope Bagieu on Creating Comics About Trailblazing Woman
First Second books have some of the most amazing graphic novels out right now, from The Prince and the Dressmaker to their new release, Brazen, by French illustrator Pénélope Bagieu. Brazen is a collection of mini-biographies of interesting women across history—from Queen Nzinga to Agnodice, the first midwife in Ancient Athens. It is a beautifully done collection, with fantastic art and a lot of love poured into every entry.
We were very lucky to be able to speak with Pénélope Bagieu about her process of deciding which women to pick for the book and where we need to go in terms of representing women.
TMS: How did you go about researching Brazen? Was there a certain set of women you wanted to write about initially or was it more an organic process?
Bagieu: Some of them had been my childhood obsessions, like Margaret Hamilton (The Wicked Witch of the West). Some others I stumbled upon while traveling, like the amazing Peggy Guggenheim in her Venetian palazzo, or the incredible Giorgina Reid while taking a hike in Montauk. Initially, I was trying to figure out which one of these wonderful women I would write a huge book about, before I realized the list was getting longer and longer. And then I thought I should give a glimpse of what I admired in each of them, within a few pages, just to make people want to know more about them. I chose 30 of them carefully for my A-list, and it wasn’t easy.
TMS: When compiling the list of women for the final draft of Brazen, how did you eventually decided who to settle on? If you had to pick a top five, which were the ones you loved working on the most?
Bagieu: I wanted to have a broader input than just my own selection, so I asked around to my girlfriends which too little-known woman had been an inspiration to them. I wanted to show that, contrary to what I had always seen in my books or in school, women who mattered were not necessarily western, cisgender, educated and white, had existed before the 20th century; they didn’t have to be queens or CEOs to have shaped history. I kept that in mind to show a variety of eras, countries, actions, and destinies. But mostly, the test they had to pass was “do I really really really love to tell their story, over and over again?” The women I shortlisted are my absolute favorites, I love them all so much, for different personal reasons. As for picking a top five, which is kind of choosing between my kids, I think I would go for the volcanologist Katia Krafft, Tove Jansson (creator of the Moomins), Nellie Bly (who invented investigative journalism), astronaut Mae Jemison and of course my Peggy Guggenheim, who led her life without caring about anyone’s opinion.
TMS: The last few years have really seen a revitalization of feminism and women coming forward to speak their truth. Is a Brazen a response to that energy and desire to push women forward? Or was this something you’d been working on for some time?
Bagieu: I started working on the project three years ago. It was my 10th book, and I think it happened at a time when, after peeling off all the layers, I extracted the core of exactly what I liked in writing women’s biographies (my previous book just before this one was a long graphic biography of Cass Elliot from the Mamas and the Papas). I need strong role models to take inspiration from, especially women whose fates didn’t go as planned, but eventually, they landed exactly where they wanted. I grew up looking up to cool and strong guys in fiction, because nobody wants to be the damsel in distress or the sidekick. But I realized all it takes is to be labeled as a hero, whether you helped a civil war to stop, or you saved a lighthouse. I thought if I portrayed these women as heroic, then they would be the cool and strong role models.
TMS: As an illustrator/cartoonist, what was the process of going through and creating these mini-biographies for each woman? How did you decide which moments were key?
Bagieu: When the book came out in France in 2016, all of the stories had been pre-published weekly by French newspaper Le Monde. Every Monday, I had to have one ready, so I was on a very tight schedule. And it happened to be one of the best creative constraint that could happen to me. It meant I only had approximately six pages to tell, not only the entire life of someone, but what was so amazing about her personality, why I related to her so much. I can’t tell their whole life. I have to focus on these few scenes that say it all. While carefully reading their autobiographies and researching and reading through articles about them, I found that all of them―whether in ancient Greece or in Queens―faced that decisive moment, that twist in their path, when they were presented with a fork on the road: the expected (by their parents, husbands, society in general), or the tough, weird, tricky side track. There is a specific moment in each of their stories, all of them, when they had to decide to go down that alternative route, knowing it would be ten times harder but also that it was the only way. That’s the scene around which I built all these stories. The rest were biographic additions to emphasize that twist, to create even more empathy.
TMS: Where do you think we are still lacking in terms of highlighting the accomplishments of women?
Bagieu: Well, to begin with, women are not raised to auto-highlight their own accomplishments. We are being told since we were born to be quiet, hardworking, and modest. It’s very difficult for us women to take a step back and appreciate our victories, even the smallest. But I think encouraging and praising other women, the ones we admire, is a good lead to rise up altogether. We need to give more high fives to women around us who take brave decisions, who challenge themselves and society, until it becomes a habit and a normal thing. That’s how we will all feel stronger and legitimate, I’m sure.
TMS: Unlike the United States, France has had a female leader elected to the office of Prime Minister. However, her time in office was marred by scandal and there hasn’t been a female PM in France since. Do you think that it is important to have female leadership, even if it ends in “failure,” rather than to wait for the “perfect” candidate?
Bagieu: Thirty years ago, French feminist Françoise Giroud said that we will achieve gender equality the day when an incompetent woman will be chosen for an important position. What women need is visibility, and the ability to project themselves anywhere in society, even at the top, even in politics, without having to reach perfection. That is also part of this automatic self-denigrating that we are so good at: we are not required to have 200% of the required capacities to try something. Not to mention that, in an equivalent position in leadership (such as PM), a woman will face twice as much bashing as a man, like in France where women in politics are being criticized on the way they raise their children or the length of their skirt. We must not wait for a license to jump in, because no one will ever give it to us.
TMS: When was the first time you felt like a Brazen woman?
Bagieu: Probably when I started working in the (then) boys club of comics, and I had to face my very first totally unfair and sexist remarks. I realized that I would be treated differently no matter what, and that it could either paralyze me, or I could decide to keep going anyway. And I was proven right, because as we are getting louder and louder in the industry, we are heard, and considered, and eventually, it won’t be a problem anymore. I’m very hopeful for the future, because younger women and girls in comics are really showing a new way.
Brazen is on sale now from First Second Books and is Bagieu’s 10th book.
(images: First Second Books)
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