Perhaps only Edward Lear is the late Edward Gorey's peer among writer-artists. Lear considered himself an artist first, and Gorey thought of himself more as a writer. Yet Lear seemingly put greater effort into the texts; Gorey, into the pictures. Lear's drawings often look tossed-off, whereas Gorey's are dense patchworks of tiny patterns, before which his Edwardian personae and fanciful creatures disport, and into which, sometimes, they visually sink. Lear addressed children first; Gorey, adults; but both appeal to anyone with a taste for morbid absurdity. But for its much greater childishness, Lear's sublime "The Story of the Four Little Children Who Went round the World" could be one of Gorey's tales of addled travel, such as "The Headless Bust" in this final omnibus, after
Amphigorey (1972),
Amphigorey Too (1975), and
Amphigorey Also (1983), of Gorey's work. There is less of Gorey at his best here, and some that seems or plainly is incomplete. Still, Gorey's unique talent should be represented as completely as possible in every collection of American art and literature.
Ray OlsonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved