Edward Gorey

• Name — Edward Gorey • Birth Name — Edward St. John Gorey • Born — 22 February 1925 • Birthplace — Chicago, Illinois, U.S. • Died — 15 April 2000 • Place of death — Cape Cod Hospital, Hyannis, Massachusetts, U.S. • Field — Writer, illustrator, poet, costume designer • Training — Art Institute of Chicago (attended) Harvard University (BA) • Movement — Literary nonsense, surrealism • Works — The Gashlycrumb Tinies, The Doubtful Guest, Mystery! • Awards — Tony Award for Best Costume Design Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis

Gorey was born in Chicago. His parents, Helen Dunham (née Garvey) and Edward Leo Gorey, divorced in 1936 when he was 11. His father remarried in 1952 when he was 27. His stepmother was Corinna Mura (1910–1965), a cabaret singer who had a small role in Casablanca as the woman playing the guitar while singing "La Marseillaise" at Rick's Café Américain. His father was briefly a journalist. Gorey's maternal great-grandmother, Helen St. John Garvey, was a nineteenth-century greeting card illustrator, from whom he claimed to have inherited his talents. Gorey was a child prodigy who began drawing pictures at eighteen months old and taught himself to read by the time he was three. From 1934 to 1937, Gorey attended public school in the Chicago suburb of Wilmette, Illinois (although he skipped several grades), where his classmates included Charlton Heston, Warren MacKenzie, and Joan Mitchell. Some of his earliest preserved work appears in the Stolp School yearbook for 1937. Afterward, he attended the Francis W. Parker School in Chicago. He spent 1944 to 1946 in the Army at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah. He then attended Harvard University, beginning in 1946 and graduating in the class of 1950; he studied French and roomed with poet Frank O'Hara. Starting in 1951, Gorey illustrated poetry books by Merrill Moore for Twayne Publishers including Case Record from a Sonnetorium (many illustrations by Gorey, 1951), and More Clinical Sonnets (1953). In the early 1950s, Gorey, with a group of recent Harvard and Radcliffe alumni including Alison Lurie (1947), John Ashbery (1949), Donald Hall (1951), and Frank O'Hara (1950), amongst others, founded the Poets' Theatre in Cambridge, which was supported by Harvard faculty members John Ciardi and Thornton Wilder. He frequently stated that his formal art training was "negligible"; Gorey studied art for one semester at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1943.

• Illustration — Gorey in the kitchen of his home in Yarmouth, Cape Cod, 1999 From 1953 to 1960, he lived in Manhattan and worked for the Art Department of Doubleday Anchor, where he illustrated book covers, added illustrations to text, and provided typographic design. He illustrated works as diverse as Bram Stoker's Dracula, H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds, and T. S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. Throughout his career, he illustrated over 200 book covers for Doubleday Anchor, Random House's Looking Glass Library, Bobbs-Merrill, and as a freelance artist. In later years he produced cover illustrations and interior artwork for many children's books by John Bellairs, as well as books begun by Bellairs and continued by Brad Strickland after Bellairs' death. His first independent work, The Unstrung Harp, was published in 1953. He also published under various pen names, some of which were anagrams of his first and last names, such as Ogdred Weary, Dogear Wryde, Ms. Regera Dowdy, and dozens more. His books also feature the names Eduard Blutig ("Edward Gory"), a German-language pun on his own name, and O. Müde (German for O. Weary). At the prompting of Harry Stanton, an editor and vice president at Addison-Wesley, Gorey collaborated on a number of works (and continued a lifelong correspondence) with Peter F. Neumeyer. The New York Times credits bookstore owner Andreas Brown and his store, the Gotham Book Mart, with launching Gorey's career: "It became the central clearing house for Mr. Gorey, presenting exhibitions of his work in the store's gallery and eventually turning him into an international celebrity." • Illustration — Poster for the 1977 Broadway revival of Dracula, art by Gorey. He won the Tony Award for Best Costume Design and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Scenic Design for the production. Gorey's illustrated (and sometimes wordless) books, with their vaguely ominous air and ostensibly Victorian and Edwardian settings, have long had a cult following. He made a notable impact on the world of theater with his designs for the 1977 Broadway revival of Dracula, for which he won the Tony Award for Best Costume Design and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Scenic Design. In 1980, Gorey became particularly well known for his animated introduction to the PBS series Mystery! In the introduction of each Mystery! episode, host Vincent Price would welcome viewers to "Gorey Mansion". Because of the settings and style of Gorey's work, many people have assumed he was British; in fact, he only left the U.S. once, for a visit to the Scottish Hebrides. In later years, he lived year-round in Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod, where he wrote and directed numerous evening-length entertainments, often featuring his own papier-mâché puppets, an ensemble known as Le Theatricule Stoique. The first of these productions, Lost Shoelaces, premiered in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, on August 13, 1987. The last was The White Canoe: an Opera Seria for Hand Puppets, for which Gorey wrote the libretto, with a score by the composer Daniel James Wolf. The opera, which was based on Thomas Moore's poem The Lake of the Dismal Swamp, was performed under the direction of Carol Verburg, a close friend and neighbor of the artist, after Gorey died. Herbert Senn and Helen Pond, two renowned set designers, created a puppet stage for the opera. In the early 1970s, Gorey wrote an unproduced screenplay for a silent film, The Black Doll. After Gorey's death, one of his executors, Andreas Brown, turned up a large cache of unpublished work, both complete and incomplete. Brown described the find as "ample material for many future books and for plays based on his work".

Gorey was devoted to the New York City Ballet, attending every performance and some rehearsals for 25 years. Critic David Ehrenstein, writing in Gay City News, argues that Gorey was discreet about his sexuality in the "Don't Ask/Don't Tell era" of the 1950s. "Stonewall changed all that—making gay a discussable mainstream topic," writes Ehrenstein. "But it didn't change things for Gorey. To those in the know, his sensibility was clearly gay, but his sexual life was as covert as his self was overt." Alexander Theroux writes that when Gorey was asked about his sexual orientation by "a rude Boston Globe reporter," he replied, "I don't even know." Theroux is referring to Lisa Solod's September 1980 Boston magazine interview ("Edward Gorey: The Cape's master teller of macabre tales discusses death, decadence, and homosexuality"). Gorey's exact words were: "Well, I'm neither one thing nor the other particularly. I suppose I'm gay. But I don't really identify with it much. I am fortunate in that I am apparently reasonably undersexed or something. I do not spend my life picking up people on the streets. I was always reluctant to go to the movies with one of my friends because I always expected the police to come and haul him out of the loo at one point or the other. I know people who lead really outrageous lives. I've never said I was gay, and I've never said I wasn't. A lot of people would say that I wasn't because I never do anything about it." Shortly thereafter, he says, "What I'm trying to say is that I am a person before I am anything else." The remark "I suppose I'm gay" was omitted when the interview appeared in Ascending Peculiarity, a collection of interviews edited by art critic Karen Wilkin. From 1995 until his death in April 2000, Gorey was the subject of a cinéma vérité–style documentary directed by Christopher Seufert. (As of 2026, the accompanying book and soundtrack have both been released and the film is in advanced post-production.) Gorey took art classes at Cape Cod Community College and volunteered as a camera operator at the local public access station, Cape Cod Community Television, where he designed illustrations and bulletin graphics. Gorey left the bulk of his estate to a charitable trust benefiting cats and dogs, as well as other species, including bats and insects.

• Illustration — Edward Gorey House, Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts (2006) Gorey's former home in Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts, is the subject of two photography books: Elephant House: Or, the Home of Edward Gorey by Kevin McDermott and Memento Gorey: The Last Interviews with Edward Gorey by Christopher Seufert. The house is now the Edward Gorey House Museum.

• Illustration — Cover of The Willowdale Handcar (1962) Gorey is typically described as an illustrator. His books may be found in the humor and cartoon sections of major bookstores, but books such as The Object Lesson have earned serious critical respect as works of surrealist art. His experimentation—creating books that were wordless, books that were literally matchbox-sized, pop-up books, books entirely populated by inanimate objects—complicates matters still further. As Gorey told Lisa Solod of The Boston Globe, "Ideally, if anything were any good, it would be indescribable." Gorey classified his own work as literary nonsense, the genre made most famous by Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear. In response to being called gothic, he stated, "If you're doing nonsense it has to be rather awful, because there'd be no point. I'm trying to think if there's sunny nonsense. Sunny, funny nonsense for children—oh, how boring, boring, boring. As Schubert said, there is no happy music. And that's true, there really isn't. And there's probably no happy nonsense, either."

• The Fantod Pack, a divination card deck, first published in Esquire (December 1966)

Many of Gorey's early works were published obscurely, making them rare and expensive. He published four omnibus editions that collect as many as 15 of his books into one volume: • Amphigorey, 1972 contains The Unstrung Harp, The Listing Attic, The Doubtful Guest, The Object-Lesson, The Bug Book, The Fatal Lozenge, The Hapless Child, The Curious Sofa, The Willowdale Handcar, The Gashlycrumb Tinies, The Insect God, The West Wing, The Wuggly Ump, The Sinking Spell, and The Remembered Visit • Amphigorey Too, 1975 contains The Beastly Baby, The Nursery Frieze, The Pious Infant, The Evil Garden, The Inanimate Tragedy, The Gilded Bat, The Iron Tonic, The Osbick Bird, The Chinese Obelisks (bis), The Deranged Cousins, The Eleventh Episode, [The Untitled Book], The Lavender Leotard, The Disrespectful Summons, The Abandoned Sock, The Lost Lions, Story for Sara [by Alphonse Allais], The Salt Herring [by Charles Cros], Leaves from a Mislaid Album, and A Limerick • Amphigorey Also, 1983 contains The Utter Zoo, The Blue Aspic, The Epiplectic Bicycle, The Sopping Thursday, The Grand Passion, Les Passementeries Horribles, The Eclectic Abecedarium, L'Heure bleue, The Broken Spoke, The Awdrey-Gore Legacy, The Glorious Nosebleed, The Loathsome Couple, The Green Beads, Les Urnes Utiles, The Stupid Joke, The Prune People, and The Tuning Fork • Amphigorey Again, 2006 contains The Galoshes of Remorse, Signs of Spring, Seasonal Confusion, Random Walk, Category, The Other Statue, 10 Impossible Objects (abridged), The Universal Solvent (abridged), Scenes de Ballet, Verse Advice, The Deadly Blotter, Creativity, The Retrieved Locket, The Water Flowers, The Haunted Tea-Cosy, Christmas Wrap-Up, The Headless Bust, The Just Dessert, The Admonitory Hippopotamus, Neglected Murderesses, Tragedies Topiares, The Raging Tide, The Unknown Vegetable, Another Random Walk, Serious Life: A Cruise, Figbash Acrobate, La Malle Saignante, and The Izzard Book

Gorey was very fond of word games, particularly anagrams. He created many of his works under pseudonyms that usually were anagrams of his own name (most famously Ogdred Weary). Some of them are listed below, with the corresponding book title(s). Eduard Blutig is also a word game: "Blutig" is German (the language from which these two books purportedly were translated) for "bloody" or "gory". • Ogdred WearyThe Curious Sofa, The Beastly Baby • Mrs. Regera DowdyThe Pious Infant, The Izzard Book • Eduard BlutigThe Evil Garden (translated from Der Böse Garten by Mrs. Regera Dowdy), The Tuning Fork (translated from Der Zeitirrthum by Mrs. Regera Dowdy) • Raddory GeweThe Eleventh Episode • Dogear WrydeThe Broken Spoke/Cycling Cards • E. G. DeadworryThe Awdrey-Gore Legacy and his grandson G.E. Deadworry • D. Awdrey-GoreThe Toastrack Enigma, The Blancmange Tragedy, The Postcard Mystery, The Pincushion Affair, The Toothpaste Murder, The Dustwrapper Secret and The Teacosy Crime (Note: These books, although attributed to Awdrey-Gore in Gorey's book The Awdrey-Gore Legacy, were not really written). She is a parody of Agatha Christie. • Waredo DyrgeThe Awdrey-Gore Legacy parody of Hercule Poirot • Edward PigThe Untitled Book • Wardore EdgySoHo Weekly News • Madame Groeda WeyrdThe Fantod Pack • Dewda Yorger"The Deary Rewdgo Series for Intrepid Young Ladies (D.R. on the Great Divide, D.R. in the Yukon, D.R. at Baffin Bay, etc.)" • Garrod WeedyThe Pointless Book

Edward Gorey was recorded at birth as Edward Saint John Gorey. He also worked under the names Eduard Blutig, Edward Bloody and Regera Dowdy. The authorities additionally record the headings Edward St. John Gorey, Edward Saint John Gorey, O. Mude, Regera Dowdy and Aedwyrd Goré. His recorded language was English. He was the child of Edward Lee Gorey and Helen Dunham Garvey.

Works recorded as notable number 3: The Fantod Pack, The Curious Sofa and The Doubtful Guest. His recorded genres are literary nonsense and surrealist.

Edward Gorey is recorded as writer, illustrator, costume designer and marionetteist.