Charity & Sylvia, Tillie Walden’s latest graphic novel from Drawn & Quarterly, chronicles the four-decade partnership of Charity Bryant and Sylvia Drake, two women who built a life together in rural Vermont in the early 1800s — openly, and with the eventual blessing of their community. It’s a story Walden found after relocating to Vermont herself and being named the state’s fifth Cartoonist Laureate, and it marks her first foray into historical biography after years of autobiographical work in books, such as the seminal Spinning.

The shift required an entirely new process. Walden immersed herself in archival letters and period novels — Pamela, Roderick Random — to find a voice that felt true to the 1800s without alienating a modern reader, and she ended up spending more time researching than at the drawing table. The result is a book rendered entirely in sepia, built on a rigid 12-panel grid, and deeply attuned to how light itself shapes a life lived by sun and firelight.

Walden talked to Prism Comics about the challenges of coloring a whole book in a single tone, why queer history feels urgent to revisit right now, and what it means to find a “hopeful” model in a couple who found acceptance through generosity rather than confrontation — in a moment when queer communities are increasingly being told they have to choose one or the other.

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OLLIE KAPLAN: You’ve said you’re drawn to doing the opposite of whatever you just finished—after Clementine, what made Charity and Sylvia’s story feel like the right next swing?

TILLIE WALDEN: Working on The Walking Dead was so much about imagining the future; it felt right to then move towards the past. I’ve always been drawn towards historical stories, and I found my way to Charity and Sylvia because of living here in Vermont (and becoming the state’s 5th Cartoonist Laureate).

KAPLAN: Obviously, the sepia color scheme gives the artwork a historical vibe. Were there any unexpected challenges or rewards for using this color scheme?

WALDEN: It was mostly challenges! I found it difficult at times to really make the sepia feel colorful, if that makes sense. I was stuck with basically a medium tone of brown, so creating a variation was my main challenge. So much of the book is influenced by light, time of day, and atmosphere. So the sepia had a heavy job to do to add to all of that.

KAPLAN: Relatedly (at least in my mind), I loved how you played with symbolic light on the page. Can you tell us more about how you approached the panel layouts?

WALDEN: Haha, it’s like I read your mind with my last answer! Light was crucial, especially when you consider a life in an era when all you had was the sun and fire to build a life around. The panel layouts, I decided early on, would be on a fixed 12-panel grid. I love the grid; I think it’s pure comics. So with every page I got to think about how to originate interesting compositions to suit the story.

KAPLAN: How did your art style evolve with this work?

WALDEN: I feel like I found a lot of balance in my art with this book. I have oscillated a lot between drawing more cartoony and more realistic, and I felt there was a nice mix of both in this story. My line seemed to come out springy and happy, but was also able to capture those darker moments full of texture.

KAPLAN: You have previously written autobiographical works about yourself (like Spinning) and others (like Tegan & Sara: Junior High). How did the process of writing a historical biography differ?

WALDEN: The process was extremely different! I’ve never had to do so much research before. I spent more time researching the book than I did actually drawing it, but it turned out I actually really enjoy spending time in archives reading ancient letters and journals. It was a deeply illuminating and beautiful time for me to read Charity and Sylvia’s words, and the words of their community members. The time spent then turning that research into a story was similar to previous comics processes, though. It involved a lot of drafting, a lot of twiddling and fixing.

KAPLAN: Charity and Sylvia found acceptance through decades of being “helpful and pious and generous” rather than through confrontation. Does that feel like a hopeful model or a sobering one, given where queer rights currently stand?

WALDEN: I think it’s both. I am inspired by their ability to find common ground with their community, and their moral strength. But they also managed to live in a time and place where being gay was so profoundly uncommon that there wasn’t yet a system to truly push them out. Now, we are forced to use all of our options. I still think generosity and understanding are essential, but confrontation and demanding change are a part of the equation as well.

KAPLAN: More generally speaking, why is it important to look back at queer history, especially in this current political moment?

WALDEN: It’s essential because American history is being rewritten in front of our very eyes. And notions of religion and faith, and how queerness intersects with that, are also being co-opted. Charity and Sylvia’s faith community ultimately welcomed them, and in America right now many Christian leaders seem intent on closing those doors. Looking back at history feels necessary as a way to understand this current moment, and to inspire us to change our present for the better.

KAPLAN: How did you balance modern sensibilities with the historical text?

WALDEN: I read a lot of novels from Charity and Sylvia’s time (about 1777 to 1850), and that really helped me capture the voice from the time. The novels were so dramatic and quick, whereas a lot of the letters I read had a much denser style of writing. I wanted to try and bridge the gap: I wanted the voices to feel like they were from the 1800s without alienating modern readers.

KAPLAN: For me, historical graphic novels always highlight how much language has changed. How do you channel an entirely different way of communicating—and what kind of research is involved, or what processes do you pursue?

WALDEN: As I mentioned above, novels were a huge help. Especially Pamela by Samuel Richardson and Roderick Random by Tobias Smollett. But I definitely did have to do some mindset shifting; it can be hard to really leave a modern sensibility behind. It got easier the more I wrote in their voices, and by the time I had finished the first draft of the book, I had totally got it down.

KAPLAN: Is there anything else you would like to add?

WALDEN: Nothing to add other than that I hope people enjoy the book! Thanks for reading.

Order your copy of Charity & Sylvia by Tillie Walden today!