Edward Gorey: His Book Cover Art and Design

Edward Gorey: His Book Cover Art and Design, with essay  by Steven Heller

Oh, this was a fun book!  It's a lovely collection of many of Edward Gorey's book covers, with particular emphasis on his early work at Anchor.  This is by no means a complete collection of all the covers Gorey ever did, even of the Anchor titles; it's just a nice sampling.  And there's a rather interesting essay to go along with the covers--again, mostly but not entirely about the Anchor period.  My favorite bit:
Gorey was given certain authors to illustrate as a matter of course.  He recalled, "I became very well known for my Henry James covers.  I hate him more than anybody else in the world except for Picasso....I've read everything by Henry James, some of it twice, and every time I do it I think, 'Why am I doing this again?  Why am I torturing myself?  I know how I feel. Why can't I just accept that?'...Everybody thought, 'Oh, how sensitive you are to Henry James,' and I thought, 'Oh sure, kids.'  If it's because I hate him so much, that's probably true."



Not in the book, but look!





Comments

  1. Hahahahaha, I find it somehow unbearably delightful that Edward Gorey did not love Henry James. Huzzah! He and I can make common cause around our mutual dislike of Henry James, should we happen to run into each other one day in the afterlife.

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  2. I know!! I think we should all have a 'we hate Henry James' party with Gorey.

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  3. Glad to find this post, even 18 months later. It was Gorey's covers that pulled me into Joan Aiken's alternate world in her Wolves of Willoughby Chase series, and I owe him a big thanks for that, not to mention how I used his Amphigorey collection to impress my college friends in 1970. I'll have to find this book and add it to my collection of Gorey-ana.

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