Imaginary interview with Jacques Faizant
by Charactorium · Jacques Faizant (1918 — 2006) · Visual Arts · Society · 6 min read
Autumn 2005, a Parisian apartment a stone's throw from the old newsrooms. On the drawing board, a pen and a bottle of India ink await tomorrow's sketch. Jacques Faizant, soft-spoken with a mischievous eye, agrees to trace back fifty years spent sketching the Republic every morning.
—Before the pencil, there were other passions in your life. How did you come to drawing?
One easily forgets that drawing was not my first passion. I first loved the sky, airplanes, that sensation of leaving the ground to see things from above — which, deep down, isn't so far from the job of a caricaturist. And I wrote, too. In 1957, I published Ni d'Ève ni d'Adam, a novel where I played with words as others juggle. The pen and India ink came later, almost by surprise, like a third language. I had discovered that a well-placed line sometimes says what an entire page struggles to express. Drawing, you see, was my way of continuing to fly and write at the same time, on a simple sheet of paper on the board.
Drawing was my way of continuing to fly and write at the same time.
—Would you say that these beginnings as a writer nourished your eye as a cartoonist?
Absolutely. A novelist learns to listen to people talk, to catch the little detail that betrays a character — a habit, a hesitation, a vanity. When I moved to drawing, I kept that ear. My characters are never quite mute: they chat, they comment, they have lines. It was the writer in me refusing to keep quiet. Writing humorous novels also taught me a valuable lesson: tenderness is better than bitterness. You can laugh at someone without hating them. That was my guiding principle, from the first book to the last sketch delivered to Le Figaro. The pencil only extended the sentence.
My characters are never quite mute: it was the writer in me refusing to keep quiet.
—What was a typical day like, with that daily drawing to deliver on the front page?
The morning belonged to the news. I read the newspapers, listened to the news, watched for the overnight event — a speech, a crisis, a sound bite — looking for the angle that would make people smile without hurting too much. The idea had to come quickly, because it alone dictated everything else. In the afternoon, I went to the board: the freehand sketch, then the inking with pen and India ink, that clean line that resists printing. And in the evening, the race against the deadline: the drawing had to go out on time, otherwise it was useless. A drawing one day late is like yesterday's newspaper — only good for wrapping fish.
A drawing one day late is like yesterday's newspaper — only good for wrapping fish.
—Wasn't that daily constraint, for over thirty years, exhausting?
It was both terrible and wonderful. Each day, the blank page started from scratch, indifferent to what you had achieved the day before. You never rest on your laurels when the deadline awaits you that very evening. But this discipline, curiously, is liberating. It forbids half-measures and waiting for the muse: you don't have the luxury of sulking over inspiration. You have to find it, right there, right now, with what you have. I kept up this pace on the front page of Le Figaro because I believe press cartooning is a craftsman's job more than an artist's — you get up, you open the workshop, you deliver. Regularity was my pride as much as my fatigue.
You never rest on your laurels when the deadline awaits you that very evening.
—Do you remember the day you drew that weeping Marianne?
November 1970. The death of General de Gaulle had just been announced, and the whole country seemed to hold its breath. Before my board, I understood that any caption would be too much, that the slightest witty remark would ring false that morning. So I drew Marianne, alone, her head resting against a pillar, collapsed. Nothing else. Not a line of text. It was a risk, because a press cartoonist is used to making his figures speak. But there are griefs before which we fall silent. That captionless drawing is perhaps the one that escaped me the most: I released it into the newspaper, and it became the readers' far more than mine.
There are griefs before which we fall silent.
—Why did you choose the figure of Marianne to embody that national mourning?
Because Marianne is not a person; she is all of us. When I make her cry, it is not a woman crying; it is the Republic, it is France, it is the reader over his coffee. The allegory has a power that the caricature of a politician will never have: it unites rather than divides. I often drew that figure in the Phrygian cap to embody the nation before events — sometimes mocking, sometimes worried. But that November day, she had to carry the grief of millions of people at once. A single silhouette of a weeping woman could say what no official speech could express. That is the privilege of the symbol: to speak for the crowd without ever betraying it.
When I make Marianne cry, it is not a woman crying; it is all of us.
—What would you say to those who are surprised that such a sober drawing became so famous?
I would tell them that sobriety is not absence; it is the height of work. Remove, always remove, until only the essential remains — that is the real craft. A sketch laden with details and captions makes you laugh for a moment and is then forgotten; a bare image settles into memory and never leaves. The Marianne of 1970 contained almost nothing, and that is why it said everything. I believe a successful press drawing is like a door: you don't fill it; you let it open onto what the reader brings to it himself. That day, each person wept their own sorrow in my line. I had only held up the mirror.
A bare image settles into memory and never leaves.
—You sketched all the presidents of the Fifth Republic. How do you approach men in power without falling into cruelty?
I saw quite a few come and go since I joined Le Figaro in 1965: the General, then Giscard in 1974, Mitterrand in 1981 with that first alternation that shook the country so much, Chirac in 1995. Each offered me his silhouette, his manner, his little foible to capture. But I never sought to humiliate. Caricature is not an execution; it is a lively conversation between the cartoonist and the powerful. You exaggerate a nose, you accentuate a pose, but you keep a fundamental respect for the office. I told myself that these men were servants of the Republic — the same as my Marianne. You can make fun of a servant without spitting on what he serves.
Caricature is not an execution; it is a lively conversation with the powerful.
—Was the alternation of 1981 a particularly interesting event to sketch for you?
It was a turning point, yes. For the first time under the Fifth Republic, power truly changed sides — the alternation ceased to be a textbook word and became a reality everyone lived. A cartoonist loves these shifts, because they reshuffle the deck: new faces, new habits, a whole new vocabulary to learn. I had to reacquaint myself with silhouettes I barely knew. But my role did not change: comment, smile, poke a little. Politics passes; the pencil remains. I have always thought that the press cartoonist is a kind of wry memory of the nation — he notes the grandeurs and the ridiculous with the same pen, and he reminds today's triumphant that they will be tomorrow's caricatures.
The press cartoonist is a kind of wry memory of the nation.
—Tell us about your famous little old ladies. Where did they come from?
My two 'little old ladies' were born almost on their own, as the best characters sometimes appear. Two elderly women, a shopping bag on their arm, chatting on a sidewalk and commenting on the world's affairs with quiet common sense. They said what I could not say myself without seeming preachy. Through their mouths, I could slip a sharp truth about ministers and the greats of this world, while keeping that tender tone that disarms. The common people recognized themselves: it was their voice, mischievous and full of ordinary wisdom. I believe people forgive two old ladies anything — even saying out loud what everyone thinks under their breath. They were my most faithful accomplices for forty years.
People forgive two old ladies anything — even saying out loud what everyone thinks under their breath.
—How do you explain readers' attachment to these recurring characters?
Because they were family. A reader who finds the same silhouettes every morning ends up loving them like neighbors. They did not judge from above; they chatted at sidewalk level, with that gentle irony of people who have seen much and are no longer surprised by much. My roots are in the Cantal, in Laroquebrou, among those popular village figures who commented on everything with mischief — my old ladies descend directly from them. They offered the reader a refuge: no matter how serious the news, you knew they would be there, exchanging a few words full of wisdom or playfulness. In a newspaper that talks about crises and power, these two gossips brought a little warmth from street conversations.
They did not judge from above; they chatted at sidewalk level.
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This imaginary interview was generated by artificial intelligence from sources documented in Jacques Faizant's profile. It dramatises what the figure might have said based on what we know about them, but does not constitute attested historical testimony. For primary sources and factual documentation, refer to the full profile.