The Best Editorial Cartoons of the Year – Anglicised
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Remember browsing the humor section of your local used book store shelves and finding those great 9″x12″ Best Editorial Cartoons of the Year volumes from Pelican as compiled by Charles Brooks (1920-2011)? Brooks edited those for 40 years until the 2012 edition.
In a bit of serendipity the very next year British cartoon historian Tim Benson began issuing his version of the brand. With a small title change the Benson series continues into this year as Britain’s Best Political Cartoons 2026.
There are a few differences between the Brooks and Benson books, I mean besides one featuring American editorial cartoonists and the other spotlighting cartoons of British political cartoonists.
The Penguin UK/Hutchinson Heinemann edition is only half as tall as the Pelican books and so contains only one cartoon per page rather than two or three and the cartoons are in full color colour.
As seen above a major difference is the paragraph by Benson briefly recounting the circumstances that inspired the cartoons, descriptions that are nearly as interesting in a historical context as the cartoons themselves and a great help to this American reader when the cartoon commentary is more UK based than worldly. (The Brooks’ volumes contain no such legends.)
While the change in leadership from Starmer to Burnham (see back cover below) as well as other events in England made headlines everywhere there are also takes on such worldwide events as the Ukraine-Russia War, the U.S./Israeli -Iran War and the resulting oil shortage and price hikes, and other affairs:
“The 2026 was the year we got (yet) another new prime minister, Mandelson and Epstein returned to haunt Westminster (again), the Green surge gathered pace and (no longer Prince) Andrew was arrested.
“Overseas, we saw war break out in Iran, Zohran Mamdani make waves in New York, and Trump be awarded one peace prize and gifted another. It was a year of by-elections, Burnham, and another baking summer, when the world cup stirred our passions and we celebrated a national treasure’s 100th birthday.”
Also: the outsized presence of Trump on the world stage. The topic of Trump takes up the majority of the introduction to the 2026 volume.
I should mention that the book’s calendar year runs from the beginning of September 2025 to the end of August 2026 which allows them to publish the 2026 edition in the year 2026 (released October 22 this year).
There are a couple things about the book that bothers me, one minor one major.
Other than one included in the introduction none of those one column-wide “pocket cartoons” are included in the book, a minor nitpick.
But unlike the American Brooks’ editions there is no index of the featured cartoonists in the back of the book. So…
Christian Adams viii, 3, 10, 23, 25, 33, 39, 47, 48, 54, 74, 86, 89, 90, 93, 100, 103, 106, 110, 126, 136, 139, 144, 146, 154, 158, 160, 168, 170, 178, 188, 191
Graeme Bandeira 28, 44, 79, 135, 159
Ella Baron xiv, 30, 37, 41, 63, 71, 78, 84, 108, 122, 152, 161, 163, 173, 176, 182, 184
Patrick Blower xii, 92, 95, 102, 107, 125, 127, 140, 153, 156, 162, 166, 171, 189
Steve Bright 65, 77, 150, back cover
Peter Brookes 8, 19, 21, 26, 29, 34, 36, 45, 52, 72, 91, 132
Dave Brown 6, 7, 14, 22, 24, 38, 50, 55, 59, 67, 94, 99, 109, 121, 128, 131
Peter Brown x
Harry Burton 117
Steven Camley front cover, 16, 40, 75, 82, 87, 105, 113, 115, 118, 120, 143, 167
Patrick Chappatte xv
Andy Davey 4, 13, 18, 31, 42, 57, 61, 83, 155, 181, 185
Rebecca Hendin 141, 187
Ben Jennings 5, 12, 17, 56, 58, 76, 85, 101, 104, 116, 123, 129, 134, 147, 149, 164, 169, 177, 180, 190
Nicole Jennings 2, 9, 53, 62, 81, 97, 112, 148
Seamus Jennings 60
Kevin Kallaugher/Kal 66, 98, 130, 137, 172, 186
Morten Morland 11, 20, 46, 88, 119, 145
Nick Newman ix
Samuel Ojo 111, 133
Chris Riddell 15, 32, 35, 51, 69, 73, 80, 96, 138, 151, 165, 175
Peter Schrank xi, 43, 49, 64, 68, 70, 114, 124, 142, 157, 174, 179, 183
Guy Venables 27
All in all a very good production and recommended for fans of political cartooning to give them a wider view of recent history, especially those of us who are too concentrated on the United States being the be-all and end-all. As for readers of Mike Peterson’s “Comic Strip of the Day” there are some images that will ring a bell and most of the cartoonists will be familiar to us.
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