Tag Archives: Edward Lear

A Hidden Drawing and a Self-Caricature by Edward Lear

At the end of the month Bonhams will be auctioning three interesting items of leariana. The most surprising is perhaps a letter to Mrs. Digby Wyatt, wife of Matthew Digby Wyatt, “a British architect  and art historian who became Secretary … Continue reading

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Vivien Noakes Obituaries

Read the Guardian obituary online. The Times also had a full page on 4 March, but it is available only to subscribers: here is the link, just in case. Above is a 1995 portrait of Vivien by her husband Michael.

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Blessed Be Nonsense!

NONSENSE Blessed be nonsense! And blessed be he who invented it! But who was he? Was he pliocene or miocene? Were little Tubal Cain and his sister Naamah sung to sleep by anything deliciously silly? Did anybody draw funny caricatures … Continue reading

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Mccoola’s Limerick Illustrations

Marika Mccoola’s portfolio on CMYK includes several beautiful illustrations for limericks by Edward Lear.

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Geneva and Vevey

I have already posted several of Edward Lear’s pictures of Switzerland (1, 2, 3), but so far none from his first visit in 1837 while he was travelling to Italy for the first time. He left London in July and … Continue reading

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More Mr. Lear

Here is another song from the Mr. Lear show in Paris, and an invitation for tomorrow’s performance:

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Reviews of Edward Lear’s Masada

Masada was probably the painting that decided Edward Lear’s fortune as a painter, and its effect was far from positive; however, 11 February 1861 was a particularly happy day for Lear as the Times published a “favourable notice” of his … Continue reading

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Edward Lear and Phonetics

John Well’s phonetic blog discusses what we can learn on Victorian pronunciation from Edward Lear’s limericks. The Opinionator NY Times blog suggests that Victorian naturalists might be a model for some of Lear’s most famous characters: The Brittle-Stars Danced. The … Continue reading

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Edward Lear and the Brothers Dalziel

So far, Lear has mentioned his nonsense rhymes very little in the Diaries; for instance on 19 September 1860, while at Little Green with the Hornbys, one of the families that most appreciated his nonsense, he writes: I sang nonsense … Continue reading

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Edward Lear Reviewed in Judy

A BOOK OF NONSENSE There was once upon a time — I think it was last Tuesday week — a silly old bald-headed gentleman, who took a Brompton omnibus, and found another silly old bald-headed gentleman inside laughing fit to … Continue reading

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