Gorey Secrets: Artistic and Literary Inspirations behind Divers Books by Edward Gorey

By Malcolm Whyte and Peter F. Neumeyer

Edward Gorey (1925–2000) was a fascinating and prolific author and artist. Of the one hundred delightful and fascinating books that Gorey wrote and illustrated, he rarely revealed their specific inspirations or their meanings. Where did his intriguing ideas come from? In Gorey Secrets: Artistic and Literary Inspirations behind Divers Books by Edward Gorey, Malcolm Whyte utilizes years of thorough research to tell an engrossing, revealing story about Gorey’s unique works.

Exploring a sampling of Gorey’s eclectic writings, from The Beastly Baby and The Iron Tonic to The Curious Sofa and Dracula, Whyte uncovers influences of Herman Melville, Agatha Christie, Edward Lear, the I Ching, William Hogarth, Rene Magritte, Hokusai, French cinema, early toy books, eighteenth-century religious tracts for children, and much more.

With an enlightening preface by Gorey collaborator and scholar Peter F. Neumeyer, Gorey Secrets brings important, uncharted insight into the genius of Edward Gorey and is a welcome addition to collections of both the seasoned Gorey reader and those who are just discovering his captivating books.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Release date: Nov 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781496836809

Malcolm Whyte

Malcolm Whyte is a graduate of Cornell University and has created more than two hundred books for readers of all ages. He published Gorey Games and Goreyography and curated nine exhibitions of Edward Gorey’s books, drawings, and graphics, for two of which he wrote and produced catalogs. Whyte is a collector of illustrated books and contemporary American art including original cartoon art, American Indian art, and old master prints.

Book preview

Gorey Secrets

Gorey Secrets

Artistic and Literary Inspirations behind Divers Books by

EDWARD GOREY

Malcolm Whyte

Foreword by

Peter F. Neumeyer

University Press of Mississippi / Jackson

The University Press of Mississippi is the scholarly publishing agency of the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning: Alcorn State University, Delta State University, Jackson State University, Mississippi State University, Mississippi University for Women, Mississippi Valley State University, University of Mississippi, and University of Southern Mississippi.

www.upress.state.ms.us

The University Press of Mississippi is a member of the Association of University Presses.

Frontis piece (page ii): Photo 1982 © by Paul Giambarba

Copyright © 2021 by M. K. Whyte

Foreword © 2021 by Peter F. Neumeyer

Edward Gorey Art & Writing © Edward Gorey Charitable Trust

Edward Gorey Photo © 1982 by Paul Giambarba

All rights reserved

Printed in Canada

First printing 2021

∞

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Whyte, Malcolm, 1933– author. | Neumeyer, Peter F., 1929– author of foreword.

Title: Gorey secrets : artistic and literary inspirations behind Divers Books by Edward Gorey / Malcolm Whyte, Peter F. Neumeyer.

Description: Jackson : University Press of Mississippi, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021031172 (print) | LCCN 2021031173 (ebook) | ISBN 9781496831552 (hardback) | ISBN 9781496836809 (epub) | ISBN 9781496836816 (epub) | ISBN 9781496836823 (pdf) | ISBN 9781496836830 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH: Gorey, Edward, 1925–2000—Themes, motives. | Gorey, Edward, 1925–2000—Criticism and interpretation. | American wit and humor, Pictorial. | Caricatures and cartoons—United States.

Classification: LCC NX512.G67 W49 2021 (print) | LCC NX512.G67 (ebook) | DDC 709.2—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021031172

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021031173

British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

Dedicated to

Karen Cross Whyte

&

Kirsty Kitchell Mooney

Anything that is art is presumably about some certain thing, but is really always about something else, and it is no good having one without the other, because if you just have the something it is boring and if you just have the something else it’s irritating.

—Edward Gorey’s Great Simple Theory about Art

Contents

Foreword by Peter F. Neumeyer

Acknowledgments

Introduction

• • •

The Gilded Bat and The Lavender Leotard

The Lost Lions

The Gashlycrumb Tinies

The Awdrey-Gore Legacy

The Eclectic Abecedarium

The Beastly Baby

E. D. Ward, A Mercurial Bear

The Loathsome Couple

The Tunnel Calamity

The Stupid Joke

The Glorious Nosebleed

The Pious Infant

Jack the Giant-Killer

Rumpelstiltskin

The Iron Tonic

The Curious Sofa

The Floating Elephant/The Dancing Rock

The Hapless Child

The Jumblies and The Dong with a Luminous Nose

The Object Lesson

Le Mélange Funeste and The Dripping Faucet

Dracula: A Toy Theatre

• • •

Afterword

Notes

Selected Bibliography

Index

Foreword

Edward Gorey and Malcolm Whyte

Malcolm Whyte, collector, philanthropist, publisher, writer, announces on the cover of this book that he has set for himself the agreeable but difficult task of finding influences that have shaped the origins of twenty-five books in the oeuvre of Edward Gorey. This is a brave undertaking, for, both in French and English, Gorey was one of the most well-read and artistically sophisticated writer–artists of recent memory. Thus, it has always been a difficult task for writers and critics to identify the often-implausible sources in the large and eclectic library of Goreyana. But Malcolm Whyte is nothing if not intrepid, and here, even as he introduces the novice to a diverse and exciting array of the work of Edward Gorey, he also presents the connoisseur with new contexts in which to consider works with which he or she may long have been familiar.

And certainly Edward Gorey’s art and texts are worth Whyte’s keen dedication and our own attention, both for their derivation and for the influence they have exerted. Gorey’s is an art that hearkens back to a trove of historical styles—primarily to the early modern English period, as well as to French and Japanese Edo book illustration. And just so, too, Gorey’s stories call to mind a broad spectrum of narrative from a veritable library of antique and contemporary literary sources, representing all genres, from pious exhortation to instructive alphabets, to parodies of accounts of ghastly murders, to the sheerest gossamer fantasy and balletic arabesque.

And Malcolm Whyte, our irrepressible guide, is himself worthy of our acquaintance. A thoroughly informed lover of many things bibliographical, his dedication to Edward Gorey’s work is generous, and his richly furnished mind makes keen associations. He seems comfortable when visiting Gorey’s worlds of murder mystery, toy theater, novelty books, and tabloid mayhem. And sometimes the sources he discovers are esoteric and stranger than fiction, as when he reveals what could only have been arrived at by assiduous sleuthing—such as Gorey’s connection to the true-life story of the globe-trotting film star behind The Lost Lions.

Gorey’s sources are innumerable. He had affection and devotion to the mystery writer Agatha Christie. At other times, he hearkens after his soul mate, Edward Lear. And in a rare venture toward the Teutonic, Gorey found inspiration in the sadistic nineteenth-century German pedagogue Heinrich Hoffman’s Struwwelpeter. Among the most intriguing of Gorey’s illustrational sources, according to Whyte, is the work of René Magritte and Salvador Dali and, most piquantly of all, the mystical Odilon Redon (for Gorey’s The Iron Tonic).

At times it seems to me that Whyte’s style suggests—in all good humor—that of Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner, who, when he cannot quite contain his own delight, takes you by the lapels and pulls you vigorously and instructively into places you’d never have ventured on your own—in this case, into flip page books, nursery rhymes, Grand Guignol, abecedaria, and other genres and curious byways. Even if you find yourself catapulted into a minibiography of the comedian Marty Feldman, you’re half convinced for the moment to suspend your incredulity.

I love Whyte the explorer, the adventurer. Both his insights and his digressions make it a pleasure to accompany him. The drama of his exposition can make his enthusiasm contagious. He makes us appreciate how very fortunate we are just to be lollygagging in the endlessly varied landscape of the verse and prose and art of Edward Gorey, seeing what there is to see and letting ourselves be surprised by the breadth, beauty, and quirkiness of what we experience.

I think Gorey himself would have appreciated the fact that he had, in Malcolm Whyte, such an empathetic, diligent, and affectionate champion.

—PETER F. NEUMEYER / Santa Rosa, 2017

Acknowledgments

For their encouragement and vital contributions in creating this book, my grateful appreciation to

Joe and Annie Bacal

Andrew R. Boose

Andreas Brown

Glen Emil

Craig Gill

Thomas M. Inge

Rick Jones

Todd Lape

Madeleine McKay

Kim Munson

Peter F. Neumeyer

Karen Cross Whyte

Gorey Secrets

Introduction

Edward Gorey (1925–2000) illustrated several hundred books, one hundred of which he wrote and illustrated. He considered himself primarily an author, then an artist, because without a story there would be no need for illustrations. I have to have a finished text before I draw, he said.¹

Erudite yet entertaining books have been published about Gorey that not only detail his working process, but also reveal him to be a keenly complex man of sweeping tastes and interests.² He collected everything, from house finials, decorative rocks, glass bottles, driftwood, iron tools, antique postcards, and stuffed animals, to stray cats, TV soap operas, professional ballet (New York City Ballet preferably), old magazines, other artists’ works, and books, books, books.

He dived into French, German, and Japanese literature, surrealism, mystery novels, and old children’s books. Agatha Christie, Herman Melville, Edward Lear, and Lewis Carroll were some of his favorite authors. William Blake, Edward Ardizzone, René Magritte, and Balthus were among his favorite artists. He had a diversified troop of friends and acquaintances: authors, actors, artists, academicians, ballerinas, restauranteurs, and booksellers among them.

Gorey’s jumble of fascinations kept his nimble brain stimulated and surely influenced his eclectic creations. To Robert Dahlin he confessed, Sometimes I take about equally from life, or from other artwork, or another book. I’m very, very catholic in my choices—sometimes it’s dance; sometimes it’s movies; sometimes other books; sometimes it’s pictures. It may be verbal; it may be visual.³ Art critic and scholar Karen Wilkin wisely notes, Often, it seems as though Gorey had no particular source in mind, but simply filtered a conception through his prodigious memory of other images or leaned on a remembered notion that vibrated sympathetically with his ideas.⁴

As Gorey advised his close friend Clifford Ross, Be open to everything. Never close your mind because you never know where your next idea may come from. You just never know.⁵ Gorey rarely revealed a specific genesis for his drawing or writing. This elusiveness brings allure to a work of art. It has intrigued me to attempt, in this exploration, to uncover sources on which his ideas are built and thus to share his creative processes with the reader.

Any book may be viewed from one of two aspects—its literary form or its physical format. Form, such as