Nicole Hollander, cartoonist who channeled wit and feminist ideas through 'Sylvia' comic strip, dies at 86

Chicagoan Nicole Hollander became a feminist icon and pioneer when her syndicated comic strip "Sylvia" hit newspapers in 1980, introducing millions to the wise-cracking, cigarette-smoking, bathtub-soaking, cat-loving, middle-aged freelance writer who called 'em like she saw 'em.

Her comics were published in a number of newspapers, including the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune, until Hollander retired in 2012.

Many women saw their own lives reflected in Sylvia's commentary about daily life, politics and relationships between the sexes.

In one signature strip, Sylvia is in conversation with a male friend who tells her "Admit it Syl ... you need us. Can you imagine a world without men?" to which Sylvia responds: "No crime and lots of happy fat women."

In another comic, Sylvia is working away on her typewriter as an ad from a nearby television proclaims "For feminine protection every day use ..." to which Sylvia fills in the blank: "A hand grenade."

"She had a radical feminist perspective, and Sylvia was the most loved and most hated comic strip in many newspapers," said her friend Tom Greensfelder, who also designed the layout for several books Ms. Hollander wrote.

"The feminist movement was often saddled with the idea that they didn't have a sense of humor, and the fact that Nicole was a feminist and was so funny put her in a very unique position within the movement," Greensfelder said.

"She kind of embodied feminism, and if you read Sylvia, one of the main points is this kind of sardonic look at relations between the sexes, but she was by no means anti-guy. She just was not afraid to call stuff out," said her friend and author Audrey Niffenegger.

"I always thought, 'Wow, she's getting away with a lot,' and she deliberately pushed the envelope," Niffenegger said. "She would find the line and step right over it. She got right in there and wasn't afraid to approach controversial issues."

Ms. Hollander died April 23 from natural causes at an assisted living facility on the Northwest Side. She was 86.

Ms. Hollander traced her biting sense of humor to childhood when she'd eavesdrop on the no-holds-barred conversations her mother had with her best girlfriends.

Ms. Hollander grew up on the West Side in an apartment building that was home to many Jewish families like hers, but was in a mostly Italian neighborhood, she said in her book "We Ate Wonder Bread: A Memoir of Growing Up on the West Side of Chicago."

Her family later moved to Rogers Park and north suburban Glencoe.

She attended Senn High School and the University of Illinois, where she studied painting.

"I went to school and painted because the advantage to being a girl in the '50s was you were just going to school to meet a professional man, so I could have really majored in anything I wanted," Ms. Hollander said during a 2010 Chicago Public Library lecture. "So I majored in art, and no one said a word about it because I was expected to get married the minute I got out of school."

A marriage to sociologist Paul Hollander, whom she met in college, ended in divorce.

Ms. Hollander, who also earned a master's in fine arts from Boston University, was working as a graphic designer and illustrator when she published her first cartoons in The Spokeswoman, a feminist magazine. Her 1979 book of cartoons "I'm in Training to Be Tall and Blond" preceded the publication of her first Sylvia cartoons in newspaper funny pages in 1980.

Ms. Hollander loved attending Sylvia look-alike contests in the 1980s at her favorite bookstore, Women & Children First in Andersonville.

The list of local undertakings that firmly entrenched her in the city's artistic community goes on and on.

She co-created ”Sylvia's Real Good Advice,” a musical in 1991 that premiered at Pegasus Players.

She also appeared in the a one-woman shows "Return to Lust" in 2005 at Pegasus Players and "Plastic Surgery or a Real Good Haircut" in 2008 at Live Bait Theatre.

A memorial that will take place in Chicago for Ms. Hollander, a longtime resident of Roscoe Village, is being planned.