Roberta Gregory

Roberta Gregory (born 1953)^[1] is an American comic book writer and artist best known for her character Bitchy Bitch from her Fantagraphics Books series Naughty Bits.^[2][3]

Biography

Gregory was born in Los Angeles, California, where her father was Disney comics writer and artist Bob Gregory. Gregory began her career in 1974 by publishing comics in the all-female Wimmen's Comix anthologies and in other 1970s underground comix, and created the strip Feminist Funnies. In 1976, she published the first issue of a feminist comic book, Dynamite Damsels, which Gregory considered to be the first regulation-sized comic book to be published by one woman.

In 1990 Gregory created "Bitchy Bitch" Midge McCracken, a woman angry at the world who frequently explodes with rage.^[4] She starred in the 40-issue series Naughty Bits, which was published by Fantagraphics from 1991 to 2004. The stories were set in present-day, though occasionally strayed to such milieu as the Middle Ages. Bitchy Bitch has a lesbian counterpart named Bitchy Butch. Beginning in 2001, a series of shorts featuring Bitchy Bitch called Bitchy Bits was shown on the Oxygen Network animated series X-Chromosome.^[5] Life's a Bitch, an animated series spun-off from the X-Chromosome shorts, aired from 2003–2004 on Oxygen in the U.S. and on The Comedy Network in Canada.

Gregory's other work includes the fantasy graphic novel Winging It, the 3-issue series Artistic Licentiousness, and the comic strip Sheila and the Unicorn.

Gregory has contributed to a number of comics anthologies, including Robert Kirby's Strange Looking Exile. In addition, she is one of the contributors to Free to Fight, the interactive self-defense project for women. Gregory has received several Eisner Award nominations in the humor, best short story, best writer, and best writer/artist categories. In 1994 she was given an Inkpot Award by Comic-Con International.

Bibliography

Comics & graphic novels

• Dynamite Damsels (self-published, 1976) — 2 issues
• Sheila and the Unicorn (Solo Productions, 1988)
• Winging It (Solo Productions, 1988)
• Artistic Licentiousness (Starhead Comix, 1991-1994) — 3 issues
• Naughty Bits (Fantagraphics, 1991-2004) — 40 issues
• Winging It 2 (self-published, 1999)

Collections

• A Bitch is Born: Adventures of Midge the Bitchy Bitch (Fantagraphics, 1994) ISBN 978-1560971566
• Naughty Bits vol. 2: As Naughty as She Wants to Be (Fantagraphics 1996) ISBN 978-1560971825 — collecting material considered too controversial for the first Naughty Bits collection
• At Work and Play with Bitchy Bitch (Fantagraphics, 1996) ISBN 978-1560973065 — material from Naughty Bits #10-14
• Bitchy's College Daze: Adventures of Midge the Bitchy Bitch (Fantagraphics, 1998) ISBN 978-1560972778— stories from Naughty Bits #15-19
• Bitchy Butch: World's Angriest Dyke (Fantagraphics, 1999) ISBN 978-1560973492 — stories from Naughty Bits #21, 23, 26, and stories from Gay Comix
• Bitchy Strips (self-published, 2001) — one-shot collection of weekly strips previously published in alternative weeklies such as the Seattle Weekly and Willamette Week
• Burn Bitchy Burn (Fantagraphics, 2002) ISBN 978-1560974925
• Life's a Bitch: Complete Bitchy Bitch Stories (Fantagraphics, 2005) ISBN 978-1560976561 — first half of Bitchy Bitch stories plus one new story

References

External links

• Official website
• Roberta Gregory on Twitter
  
• Roberta Gregory interview
• Roberta Gregory at the Comic Book DB