New Releases by Edward Gorey

A sweeping, gorgeously produced celebration of beloved American writer, artist, and illustrator Edward Gorey on his 100th birthday. Issued by the Edward Gorey Charitable Trust and produced in creative partnership with The Edward Gorey House. For more than seven decades, Edward Gorey''s work has delighted fans of all ages and inspired artists across multiple disciplines. His collection of self-authored books, which comprises more than 100 volumes including The Gashlycrumb Tinies and The Doubtful Guest, remains a profoundly radical and uncompromised body of work. Viewed either separately or in their entirety, these works represent one of the most unique voices in American arts and letters. E Is for Edward celebrates Edward Gorey as author, illustrator, humorist, playwright, printmaker, fabric artist, and stage designer, showcasing the vast array of material he created between 1953 and his death in 2000. Curated by Gregory Hischak, Director of The Edward Gorey House, the book is organized by major themes and topics that characterize Gorey''s work including hapless children, mutant menageries, the murder mystery, the ballet, sartorial elegance, stylized decor, and the many recurring motifs and latent symbolism that underlie these subjects. In addition, Hischak offers a look into the pages of the dozens of rarely-viewed notebooks kept by Gorey throughout his lifetime. Illustrated with hundreds of original pieces of art and archival material, E Is for Edward is a must-have for every fan and the most comprehensive, in-depth exploration of Gorey''s art in more than a decade.

On the envelopes of letters sent to a dear friend, the famed artist and writer Edward Gorey drew dozens of original illustrations—illustrations now collected in this volume along with marvelously playful selections from the correspondence, all never before seen by the public until now. From Ted to Tom will be published in the centenary year of Edward Gorey''s birth. When Tom Fitzharris met Edward "Ted" Gorey in 1974, the two quickly struck up a friendship. Over the next year Gorey sent a total of fifty letters to Fitzharris. Every envelope Fitzharris received was illustrated by Gorey, and filled with surprises: typewritten letters with news and opinions from Gorey''s life, handwritten note cards with unexpected quotes, sketches, inside jokes, and a host of other joyous miscellany. Assembled here for the first time, these envelopes and their contents deliver all the humor, imagination, gossip, and wonder that came with being Edward Gorey''s pen pal.

Our story opens with a cat stuck in a tree, an ordinary-enough occurrence. Fletcher the cat, having run up the tree in a moment of thoughtless abandon, cannot get back down. Then strange things begin to happen: Fletcher finds in his tree a steamer trunk full of hats, and among the hats a papier-mâché egg that opens to reveal Zenobia, a worldly talking doll who was locked in the egg by an unfeeling child named Mabel. To cheer each other up, Fletcher and Zenobia decide to throw a party, complete with cake, peach ice cream, and punch from a silver punch bowl. The hats come in handy, and a moth, drawn to the festivities, soon becomes the vehicle of an unexpected escape plan. A story of metamorphosis and friendship, like The Owl and the Pussycat crossed with Alice in Wonderland, Fletcher and Zenobia is a wildly imaginative tale of wish fulfillment and freedom. At once silly and zany, it is not without a certain delicacy of feeling that older children, and adults, will also appreciate.

A rare and irreverent, previously unpublished story by the late author of The Wuggly Ump profiles offbeat Saint Melissa, whose canonization occurred despite her Miracles of Destruction, through which she would induce migraines, refine lust and set supernatural traps that have yet to be sprung. 15,000 first printing.

An umbrella is missing. A man is distressed. A thief scampers over rooftops. A child is in danger. A Harangued salesclerk weeks. A dog saves the day. The intriguing story of The Sopping Thursday is unlike any other Edward Gorey book, both because of its unique gray-and black illustrations and because it has a happy ending (if one is to dismiss any worry about the child featured inthe last frame). In just thirty imags and thirty short lines of text, Gorey manages to create a complex tableau of characters and a plot worthy of film noir. Long out of print, this new edition is faithful to the size of Gorey''s original drawings and wisely refrains from offering any editorial commentary...except to say this Gorey jewel is--to quote the eminent literary critic Edmund Wilson---A brilliant discovery.

With his typically dark, droll humor, Edward Gorey presents the transformation of Maudie Splaytoe, a girl prone to staring at dead birds, into Mirella Splatova, a chic and mysterious prima ballerina. This woeful tale chronicles an ascent to the peak of fame, followed by an unexpected and dreadful demise. Gorey''s exquisitely crafted illustrations of magical ballets, elegant drawing rooms, and stark apartments set the stage for this melodrama starring a slightly peculiar heroine. Faithfully re-released in this superb new edition, The Gilded Bat is one of the hundred or so eerily fanciful illustrated tales created by Edward Gorey (1925-2000) to the delight of his adoring fans. Gorey was also a playwright, an award-winning set and costume designer, and the creator of the animated introductions to the PBS series Mystery!

Figbash is acrobatic, topiaries are tragic, hippopotami are admonitory, and galoshes are remorseful in this celebration of a unique talent that never fails to delight, amuse, and confound readers. This latest collection displays in glorious abundance the offbeat characters and droll humor of Edward Gorey.

In this enigmatic, surreal, wonderfully entertaining tale, three mysterious figures set out from Willowdale, traveling by handcar. At once deeply vexing and utterly hilarious, darkly mysterious and amusingly absurd, "The Willowdale Handcar" is vintage Gorey.

Another Goery masterpiece unfolds in this dark tale of surreal morality. Illustrations.

A vivid self-portrait in words of one of the great American artists of the twentieth century. Designed to appeal to Gorey lovers as well as those seeking an introduction to his work, Ascending Peculiarity includes reproductions of previously unpublished drawings and photographs. Edited by Karen Wilkin. Edward Gorey''s extraordinary and disconcerting books are avidly sought and treasured throughout the world, but until now little has been known about the man himself. While he was notoriously protective of his privacy, Gorey did grant dozens of interviews over the course of his life. And as the conversations collected in this book demonstrate, he proved to be unfailingly charming, gracious, and fascinating. Here is Gorey in his own words, ruminating on everything from French symbolist poetry to soap operas, from George Balanchine and the unique beauty of ballet to Victorian photographs of dead children. We meet the artist in his ramshackle book-lined studio in Manhattan and his equally bizarre house on Cape Cod. We listen as he describes his legendary upbringing and vast range of influences, as well as how he managed to work amid all his cats.

The annual charity fête at Backwater Hall in Mortshire is disrupted by the mysterious death of Lord Wherewithal and the theft of the Lisping Elbow. Confusion and misgivings abound. And, alas, the Earl of Thump''s stuffed thisby is found disemboweled by the edge of the lake. Dr. Belgravius and his nephew, Luke Touchpaper, attempt to tie the loose ends together and wonder why Miss Underfold was seen wearing a hat decorated with black lilies. And why was Victoria Scone dancing the tango with Horace Gollop in The Soiled Dove? Edward Gorey creates an intriguing and sharply mordant world and leaves us his own mystery: What has happened to the missing Night Bandage, volume two of the Mortshire secrets?

Profiles of 16 decisive struggles from ancient and modern times. Gripping accounts range from Alexander the Great''s overthrow of the Persian empire in the 4th century BC to World War II''s Battle of Midway. Pratt depicts the circumstances leading up to the decisive clashes, the personalities involved, and the historically important aftermath. 27 maps.

The late illustrator, theater designer, and author offers a macabre and surreal look at winter.

As we wander off with Edward Gorey into the next millennium our reasons for being here are far from clear. Nevertheless, the master craftsmen is at his best . . Ere the last guest was fin''lly gone.Ccedil;a va, heacute;las, from bad to worse: Adieu to prose, alloacute; to verse. The Bahhumbug with lack of tact. Now called attention to the fact, Which made it feel to Edmund Gravel. He was already to unravel

Called "a small masterpiece" by the "Times Literary Supplement, " this book, originally published in 1953, takes a look at the literary life and its attendant woes: isolation, writer''s block, professional jealousy, and plain boredom. Illustrations.

The Quingawaga and Mork, Fidknop and Ampoo are among the fantastical imaginings of Edward Gorey''s Utter Zoo Alphabet. The twenty-six postcards (one for each letter of the alphabet) feature Gorey''s illustrations of unusual and biologically questionable creatures, each one described by a typically witty Gorey couplet.

A new, small-format edition of one of Gorey''s "dark masterpieces of surreal morality" (Vanity Fair) - a witty, disquieting journey through the alphabet. -- Provided by the publisher

The story of an intrepid voyage of epic proportion with a hero unequaled in the annals of literature. Gorey is "a man of enormous erudition . . . an artist and writer of genius" ("The New Yorker").

In his Preface to "A Christmas Carol", Charles Dickens wrote that he tried "to raise the Ghost of an Idea" with readers and trusted that it would "haunt their house pleasantly". In December 1997, 154 Christmases later, the "New York Times Magazine" asked its own Edward Gorey to refurbish this enduring morality tale. The result is this "dispirited and distasteful diversion for Christmas". Illustrations.

Gorey''s naughty, hilarious travesty of lust, now reissued in a special gift edition. "A master of the genre of graphic storytelling and a brilliant draftsman" (New York Times Book Review).

Thumbs up for an all-new adventure by Edward Gorey, his first in five years. For his fans, no more need be said. For those still to be introduced, this is a delightful, astonishing, provocative, laugh-out-loud funny book.

Perhaps its author''s most unpleasant book ever.

Stretches out to reveal a land inhabited by gremlins, elves, trolls, fairies, witches, dragons, unicorns, and a prince and princess.