Tag Archives: Limerick

W.S.’s Bosh Available Online

Posted on July 7, 2023 by Marco Graziosi

Dough Harris informs me that the limerick book I discussed here, Bosh by W.S. (London: Bickers & Son, 1876) is now available online at Google Books. According to Bob Turveys’s The Secret Life of Limericks (2025, chapter 5) W.S. was “the … Continue reading →

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A Batch of Irish Learics

Posted on May 12, 2023 by Marco Graziosi

In a previous post, like this one inspired by Doug Harris, I showed a page of “Irish Literary Learics” from   Idyls of Killowen: A Soggarth’s Secular Verses (London: James Bowden, 1899), by Matthew Russell, S.J. The same limericks, however had already … Continue reading →

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On Bawdy Limericks and Edward Lear (again)

Posted on April 14, 2023 by Marco Graziosi

From the Vaughan Williams Foundation website: Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood Letter No.: VWL1485 From R. Vaughan Williams, The White Gates, Westcott Road, Dorking. [3 February 1940] My Dear I went and got a Lear1 at once – … Continue reading →

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Cylinder Nasties and Some T.S. Eliot Limericks

Posted on April 8, 2023 by Marco Graziosi

One of the “Limerick Company” I occasionally hear from, Bob Turvey, mentioned the following article from the 5 March 2023 Sunday Times “Culture” supplement, pp. 24-25: Here is the passage of interest from the book being reviewed: Another star, and arguably … Continue reading →

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John Parry’s Stray Leaves from “A Book of Nonsense”

Posted on March 19, 2023 by Marco Graziosi

This page containing nine limericks (which was kindly provided by Doug Harris) comes from John Parry’s Ridiculous Things Scraps and Oddities: Some with and Many Without Meaning, London: T. McLean, 1854. In the November 20, 1869 issue of Once a … Continue reading →

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Aubrey Beardsley’s Limerick on Illustrating Le Morte Darthur

Posted on January 24, 2023 by Marco Graziosi

This manuscript records memories of Aubrey Beardsley’s mother about amateur theatricals put on at home by the adolescent Aubrey and his sister, Mabel, and her  son’s reluctance to fulfil his commission to illustrate an edition of Le Morte Darthur (1893–1894). … Continue reading →

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“Nonsense!” – Words from Edward Lear, music by Mel Orriss

Posted on January 13, 2022 by Marco Graziosi

Festive Flutes and Mel Orriss perform six of Lear’s limericks set to music.

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Legend of the Large Mouth

Posted on October 4, 2021 by Marco Graziosi

Food is one of the recurrent themes of Victorian Nonsense and Edward Lear certainly used it quite a lot; some of his limericks present gluttony as rather scary, for instance ther “Old Man of Calcutta”: The “Old man of the … Continue reading →

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Variant Versions of Edward Lear’s Limericks

Posted on July 1, 2021 by Marco Graziosi

‘There was an old person of Skye,/ Who was nearly a hundred feet high;/ He seemed to the people/ As tall as a steeple,/ And served as a lighthouse on Skye.’ (upper left) pen and brown ink, partial watermark ’18…’ … Continue reading →

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Three New Pieces of Nonsense by Edward Lear

Posted on June 24, 2021 by Marco Graziosi

The latest TLS (no. 6169 of 25 June 2021) contains three new Nonsense compositions by Edward Lear, found by Amy Wilcockson and Edmund Downey among the papers in the Charnwood Autograph Collection, British Library Add MS 70949, f. 239, f. … Continue reading →

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