ABOUT STUART DOUCH
Given your eclectic blend of talents, would you say you’re primarily a historian, educator or artist?
I'm really lucky to be able to embrace all these roles. Whether it's in the classroom, through my love of storytelling and drawing, or by listening and inspiring others to improve, I have the opportunity to work as all three.
“Working with History lets you dive into amazing and exciting moments where other people did extraordinary things in magical, iconic places.”
INTERVIEW
How do your different roles influence and complement each other in your work?
As an artist, I find myself imagining what those people and places look like, or looked like, when I’m getting ready to teach History: a battle, Tudor politics, the history of medicine. Teaching English and reading brilliant books in class is also a permanent refresher for what your mind dreams up. New stories - and your favourites - make you see in your mind other worlds.
You describe yourself as a graphic artist. define the difference between artist and graphic artist?
For me, an artist could be a sculptor, a potter, a painter, a photographer or a printmaker. The kinds of discipline some call ‘Fine Art’. Their goal is to express themselves, to showcase their technical skill as well as their heart and soul. By ‘graphic artist’, I think of myself as someone who uses pictures - in my case comic strips in graphic novels - to tell a story.
Much of your work brings the past alive for children. How do you make history engaging?
When I was in college and read pages and pages of unillustrated but informative books that doused me in a Niagara Falls of dates and names and events. But, I felt disconnected from them. I couldn’t see why they mattered. Did I ‘switch off’? Yes, actually. I passionately believe images help children have a context. When you put faces to names, you emotionally invest with the material. And I like to season it with a sense of humour.
Which historians or authors have made history come alive for you?
My favourites include Tracy Borman, Dan Jones, and Lauren Johnson. Joanne Paul’s The House of Dudley was also gripping; Marc Morris’ books on The Anglo-Saxons and The Norman Conquests are also brilliant. Suzi Edge’s Mortal Monarchs is a new favourite. In terms of comic histories, I love the work of Art Spiegelman’s Maus, the Charley’s War comic by Pat Mills and Joe Colquhoun, and Berlin by Jason Lutes, as well as Chernobyl: The Fall of Atomgrad by Matyáš Namai.
What is your favourite historical era?
I think at heart it has to be the medieval period.
I’ve been drawn to the work of many historians who have shed light on those who previously were reduced to footnote status, but now we see as gripping and vital characters. I’m thinking of women, like Eleanor of Aquitaine, Margaret Beaufort, Matilda of Flanders. Two of those Queens I have read about these past few years in works by Sara Cockerill and Tracy Borman. I’m waiting for Lauren Johnson’s book on Margaret Beaufort to come out.
Telling stories about women airbrushed out by mainly male historians is important. I’ve shown in my 1066 book that I have coming out in 2025 how Harold should have listened to his mum, Gytha. Things might have been different if he had!
Ambrose Bierce once said history is “an account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers mostly knaves, and soldiers mostly fools.” What’s your perspective?
I start by finding the earliest historical narrative. That storyline is always vulnerable to bias, so one needs to study its provenance and if necessary treat it with care. Then I work forward and look at later sources. What’s the commonality they share with the earliest source? Why is one different? What was going on when they were written? That way one starts knocking on the door of the truth. I find a plan of a historical story can then be written down.
When you're working on a new piece of art or a graphic novel, what fuels your creativity?
My studio! It is my best place to work; everything I need is there and I have peace and quiet to focus. I have a broad taste in music but usually play some Electronic music - Kraftwerk, Neu!, Michael Rother, Harmonia, Depeche Mode - to get the ideas going.
I always make a plan of a story - I know where it has to end, so I might be looking at what’s on a page, and the idea comes: “It might be fun to do this … let's show this moment differently.” I also work with an amazing editor and when he gives me help and advice, it’s always good.
the LIFE journey that led you to where you are today?
I was lucky to go to the fabulous Old Rectory Nursery school in Coombes, West Sussex: a 15th-century timber-framed house in idyllic countryside, with a dog who barked your years in "woofs" on your birthday! Brianne Reeve, my teacher, showed me the magic of reading stories. I’ve never stopped…
I then went to Sompting Abbotts Prep School. My love of writing and reading were developed and I learned I loved languages. My art teacher (who I'd work as a colleague with later) encouraged my art further and Larry Hershon kept the fire burning with inspirational English teaching.
My senior school was Lancing College, by the end of which teachers Mr Tomlinson and Mrs Bentley had introduced me to Austen, Caryl Churchill, Tom Stoppard, Chaucer, Webster and Marvell, as well as Hamlet, and Antony and Cleopatra.
I gained a BA (Hons) in English and Art (Printmaking) from Canterbury Christ Church University and an MA in Modern Literature and Culture with Creative Writing from the University of Kent.
After working as an artist in residence in and around Kent, I trained as a teacher. I worked at a small private school before joining Shoreham College, teaching GCSE English and History mainly.
Two years later, the post of Head of English came up at my old school, Sompting Abbotts. After my first year finished in 2006, the Head of Drama retired and I was volunteered to take this on too.
Now working with my childhood art teacher, Maria Stanley-Clamp, I learned the tough lessons of putting on school plays from her, her team and the outgoing Drama Head, Jane Gough, and her husband, Michael. I wrote four musicals from 2007 to 2012 with parts for children. We put together bands to play live music for the actors to sing with.
In 2012, Tim Sinclair, the headteacher, suddenly died. It was a horrific and shocking time. The future of the school was at a crossroads. I was offered the role of Head, accepted, and remained in the role until 2023. I took up History teaching too. In 2017, I began drawing the first of four graphic history novels.
Being the Head was an immense privilege and the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and probably will ever do, in my life.
By 2022, I felt I needed to look after my health more and wanted to get my work published. I worked with the school's owners and leadership team to talk through next steps; they appointed a new Head and asked me to stay on and keep teaching.
Now, I still teach three days a week at Sompting Abbotts and am down in my studio for the rest of the time.
Stuart lives in North Lancing, West Sussex, with his wife, Becky, two cats, an elderly friendly rabbit and a grumpy younger rabbit. He says: "There's a lot of green up here - fields, trees and in my 1066 book you can see the influence of that in many panels. Also, there are lovely old buildings, as well as our parish church, whose choir I'm part of, so there's a good bit of History too."