TOONDER, MARTEN

(1912–2005)

Comic-strip writer who founded the Toonder Studios, which was a cover for resistance organizations during World War II. His best-known characters were Olivier B. Bommel and Tom Poes (Mr. Bumble and Tom Puss), whom he situ ated in a fairy-tale world, but one with very identifiable characters. Their 177 comics—always three pictures with text below—were published in many European dailies and weeklies for half a century. An animated cartoon—“Als je begrijpt wat ik bedoel,” 1983 [English translation, “The Dragon That Wasn’t (Or Was He?),” 1987] — was taken from the album De Zwelbast. Toonder enriched the Dutchlan guage with several words and expressions.