Rodolphe Töpffer (31 January 1799 - 8 June 1846) was a Swiss teacher, author, painter, cartoonist, and caricature artist. He is also considered to be the first modern comic creator.
He was born in Geneva to Adam-Wolfgang Töpffer (20 May 1766 - 10 August 1847). His father was a professional painter and occasional caricature artist. The elder Töpffer's main claim to fame is serving from 1804 to 1807 as "Drawing Master" of Joséphine, Empress- consort of the First French Empire.
Rodolphe sought an education in Paris, France from 1819 to 1820. Then he returned to Geneva where he found employment as a school teacher. By 1823 he was able to establish his own boarding school for boys. In 1832 he was appointed Professor of Literature at the University of Geneva.
Relatively successful in his chosen profession, Rodolphe would gain his fame from the activities he pursued in his spare time. He depicted a number of local landscapes in paintings considered influenced by the contemporary movement of Romanticism. He became an author of short stories and occasionally entertained his students by drawing caricatures.
The later two of his activities would be combined in a number of illustrated comedic accounts. The first of them, Histoire de M. Vieux Bois (The story of Mr. Wooden Head), was completed by 1827 but not published until 1837. It consisted of 30 pages, each containing one to six drawn panels with a caption of narration below. It was translated and republished in the United States in 1842 as The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck.
Töpffer's stories were produced by autography, a variation of lithography that allowed him to draw on specially prepared paper with a pen. This process allowed for a loose line, quicker and freer than engraving, the usual process for printed illustration at the time.
The comedic story was not originally intended for publication but Rodolphe continued to create others in his spare time to entertain his acquaintances. Notable among them was Johann Wolfgang von Goethe who in 1831 persuaded Rudolphe to publish his stories. Seven of them were eventually published in newspaper form across Europe but Goethe would not live to see them.
All seven are considered satirical views of 19th century society and proved popular at the time. In 1842 Rodolphe published Essais d'autographie. On 14 September 1842 the Histoire de M. Vieux Bois was first introduced to a United States audience as The Adventures of Mr. Obadiah Oldbuck. It was published in comic book form as a supplement to that day's edition of Brother Jonathan, a New York, New York newspaper published by author John Neal (25 August 1793 - 20 June 1876). It has come to be considered the first American comic book and, according to several Robert Beerbohm articles published in Comic Art and the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide, the inspiration for an entire U.S. genre of nineteenth-century graphic novel.
Rodolphe is considered alternatively the father or at least an important precursor to the modern art form of comics. He is also considered to be an influence to younger comic artists such as Wilhelm Busch (15 April 1832 - 9 January 1908), creator of Max and Moritz.