Edward Gorey: The original Tim Burton
Edward Gorey was an American writer and illustrator known for his unique style, love of cats, and the playful, Victorian-style characters in his work. He was born on February 22, 1925 and would have celebrated his 88th birthday on Friday. Google is celebrating the artist with a collection of Gorey drawings gracing the search engines homepage today.
Gorey lived in Chicago as a child and he claims to be mostly a self-taught artist, he spent only one semester at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1943. He later attended Harvard University from 1946 to 1950, where he joined ranks with other Harvard alumni and founded the Poets' Theatre in Cambridge, Mass.
He lived most of his later years in his home on Cape Cod.
Gorey has said that he got his talent from his maternal great-grandmother, Helen St. John Garvey, who was a popular 19th century greeting card writer and artist.
Gorey wrote more than 100 books and illustrated reprints of books such as 鈥淒racula鈥� by Bram Stoker, 鈥淭he War of the Worlds鈥� by H. G. Wells, and a collection of whimsical poems titled 鈥淥ld Possum's Book of Practical Cats鈥� by T. S. Eliot.聽
He classifies his own gothic pen and ink style as 鈥渓iterary nonsense.鈥澛�
Gorey鈥檚 鈥渨icked and whimsical鈥� animations were used to introduce the ," since the series began in 1980.
Daniel Handler, known as Lemony Snicket, told the in 2011:
鈥淲hen I was first writing 鈥楢 Series of Unfortunate Events,鈥� I was wandering around everywhere saying, 鈥業 am a complete rip-off of Edward Gorey,鈥� and everyone said, 鈥榃ho鈥檚 that?鈥� Now, everyone says, 鈥楾hat鈥檚 right, you are a complete rip-off of Edward Gorey.鈥� 鈥�
Mr. Handler and director Tim Burton, known for the film "Edward Scissorhands,"聽are just two artists who owe some gratitude to Gorey for setting the stage for the Goth genre.聽
But Gorey wouldn't want readers to dig into his books or his style too deeply. The New York Times article quotes Gorey鈥檚 favorite saying: 鈥淲hen people are finding meaning in things 鈥� beware.鈥�
