Introduction

To say that Edward Gorey’s works are unique is an understatement. His illustrations and his sparse, well-articulated words come together to create an idiosyncratic atmosphere that is distinctly Gorey’s. The combination of these visual aspects and the alarmingly comical and macabre content have led some to call Gorey the Tim Burton of his day. The humor and darkness of Gorey’s works drew our group members to study a few of his texts more closely. His books are simultaneously somber and playful, doleful and lively, violent and calming. We found it intriguing how all of these themes coexisted within each of Gorey’s works, and they made us wonder who these books were written for.

In some cases Gorey’s texts are identified by the book market as children’s literature, and at other times they are advertized primarily for an adult audience. Occassionally a single book switches markets over the course of its reprints. For the purposes of this exhibit we have defined children’s literature as literature that is marketed toward (and deemed appropriate for) the modern day child. When considering this definition of children's literature, it's important to remember that children are not making purchasing decisions. Marketing appeals largely to the parent, and if a parent deems a book to be too dark or scary or otherwise unsuitable for their child, they will not buy it. In the last century-and-a-half or so, explicitly-stated death has been considered "adult content," outside of the realm of bibliotherapy (books made specifically for children to help deal with death). Gorey flies in the face of this trend, and his books deliberately question this censoring of death from children. Much of this exhibit is dedicated to examining what kind of audience Gorey was hoping to reach with his different works, because the marketing of the book rarely reflects his intentions. 

Our exhibit closely examines four of Gorey's works, in order from youngest intended audience to oldest: The Wuggly Ump, The Dwindling Party, The Gashlycrumb Tinies, and The Fatal Lozenge. Interestingly enough, while conducting research on what is deemed appropriate for children to read, sources don't always focus on the subjective maturity of the content, but on reading levels and relatability. Some texts, such as The Gashlycrumb Tinies appeared to be direct parodies of common didactic children’s texts that taught the alphabet, but meant to be for adult readership, while others such as The Wuggly Ump were fun, nonsense literature for children. The following sections will explain the understanding each of our group members gained through close analyses of each text.

On first glance, Edward Gorey’s The Wuggly Ump is decidedly a book for children, but it is still unique in its macabre and absurd qualities that set it apart from most of its children’s literature contemporaries. The Wuggly Ump is highly Carrol-esque with its rhyming couplets and nonsensical words. It seems as though half of the words in the text are of Gorey’s own invention, such as lines like “sing terraloo, sing terralay, the Wuggly Ump lives far away,” which are vaguely reminiscent of "Jabberwocky." Something interesting to note about the illustrations are the facial expressions of the three children. In the beginning they seem to be content and peaceful as they play and go about their normal lives, but as the story progresses their expressions change. As the reality of the Wuggly Ump’s advances become more evident, one would expect the children to become dreadfully frightened, but instead they just appear more and more listless and disinterested. By the end, they are trapped within the Wuggly Ump’s stomach and look merely mildly uncomfortable and disadvantaged by their predicament. What makes this book also seem more childlike is the absence of any real violence. The children being eaten is never depicted, the pain of the event never described, and there is no blood or wounds anywhere to be seen. The absence of violence, colorful illustrations, sing-song rhyming structure, and overall tone of playful nonsense allow this text to be read as highly geared toward a child audience.

Intended audience is an important consideration concerning Edward Gorey’s pop-up book, The Dwindling Party. Certain aspects of the text, such as the illustrations and rhyme scheme, suggest that it is intended for children, while other aspects, such as the textual content, suggest it may be intended for adults. Together, these different aspects work together to create the type of complex work that Edward Gorey is best known for. Perhaps the most clear indication of intended audience is the lively and playful pop-up illustrations. When considering the interactive qualities of the illustrations as well as the ABAB rhyme scheme, they seem far more geared toward a younger readership. A rhyme scheme such as ABAB is more simplistic and common in children’s books such as nursery rhymes. The deaths of the plot are never explicitly confronted in the text of the book, but the events leading up to the deaths are shown in the illustrations, and this slight censorship also contributes to the impression that this work is meant for children. However, the content of the book is not necessarily typical for a children’s text. There is a large quantity of death in this book and many of the characters, such as Neville, handle the death so nonchalantly that it leads to an overall theme of absurdity and senselessness towards violence. This additional consideration makes it more difficult to clearly categorize the elusive Gorey text.

Out of all of Gorey’s work, one of the most hotly debated is The Gashlycrumb Tinies. The overwhelming question for most readers seems to be “who is it for?” It appears to be a children’s book, albeit one full of very dark, somewhat grotesque illustrations. It is child-sized, able to fit easily into small hands, and every two-page spread has a full-page illustration with limited text. It's an alphabet book, a genre commonly used to teach children their letters. On the other hand, the illustrations are filled with death, both implicit and explicit, which challenges the taboo on death in modern children's literature. Bringing the message home, the cover has the Grim Reaper hovering over the children like the most under-qualified nursemaid of all time. Gorey is unique as a picture-book author because he faces death head-on. While many may feel that this weights the book in the direction of adult readers (and in fact it was originally marketed as such), death is a reality that children also face. Because Gorey is both the illustrator and author of The Gashlycrumb Tinies, his illustrations shed light on how he intends his words to be interpreted. For example, a little girl, Prue, is said to be trampled in a brawl. The accompanying image shows Prue stretching up to reach the handle of a saloon door, implying that she’ll shortly be crushed underfoot. Gorey’s illustrations also highlight another unique aspect of his work. Rather than depicting adults as sources of comfort and protection—as is the case in most modern children’s books—adults are, at best, completely absent from, and, at worst, the direct cause of, each death. One of Gorey's most child-directed messages is that children cannot trust strange adults, and sometimes not even the familiar ones are safe. Gorey's use of death is both a teaching method and an inevitable truth of life.

Edward Gorey’s The Fatal Lozenge is a collection of alphabetical 4 line poems, which are dark and satirical in nature. At first glance, The Fatal Lozenge comes off as a dark book of poetry for children. There is a small amount of text and the poems read like nursery rhymes. Taking a closer look, the descriptive adult language and the blatant content of these poems scream adult audience. Gorey, in one of his poems, writes: “An Orphan whom there’s none to cherish strays through the gloom on naked feet; She presently will fall, and perish unnoticed in some squalid street”. Above this is a drawing of an emaciated young child, Gorey emphasizing the sheer cruelty of the world. In a way, the short poems facilitate Gorey’s motives because his messages are to the point and their brevity is jarring to the reader. He presented The Fatal Lozenge as a children’s book to emphasize the childlike fear of his adult audience, and force the truth that adults do not want to come to terms with into his reader’s faces. The book connects the child and adult realms, disguising the fear with palatable alphabetical rhyme, to ironically veil the adult’s theoretical monsters and fears in a cloak of nostalgic childhood comfort. Children fear monsters and creatures and the unknown. Adults fear the truth and the sad reality that life can be sometimes. Gorey knew both to be true, and thus created his most deceiving and enlightening book: The Fatal Lozenge. The Fatal Lozenge is essentially the adult counter to Gorey’ other work, The Gashleycrumb Tinies, which is also a part of our exhibit. In The Gashlycrumb Tinies, Gorey’s children die abruptly from A to Z. In The Fatal Lozenge, the majority of the subjects up for misfortune are adults, and not all of their fates are ultimately death. The book illuminates the adult’s darkest fears, life’s bitter and sad reality. A baby can really grow up to be a thug, and a suicide, whilst falling to her death, can realize what she has done is a mistake. This is Gorey’s smartest work because there is nothing too vulgar or grotesque about any of the stories, they’re all potential outcomes of a person’s life and that is what makes them so jarring. In doing this, he is targeting adult audiences, scaring, surprising or amusing them with his incredible truthful and honest depictions of real life.

In conclusion, not one of the books we selected, between The Wuggly Ump, The Dwindling Party, The Gashlycrumb Tinies, or The Fatal Lozenge, were easily categorizable into the genres of either children or adult literature. However, we did find that they normally lend themselves to one side more favorably than the other, as evidenced by their illustrations, text, or content itself. The Wuggly Ump was proven to be the most childlike, while The Fatal Lozenge was the most adult-themed. We hope you enjoy our exhibit! Within the following pages you will find a close-up look at the texts with a few highlights from each.