Edward Lear - part 17

1885 Self-Portrait with his cat "Foss"

Edward Lear (1812  - 1888) was an English artist, illustrator, musician, author and poet, and is known now mostly for his literary nonsense in poetry and prose and especially his limericks, a form he popularised. His principal areas of work as an artist were threefold: as a draughtsman employed to illustrate birds and animals; making coloured drawings during his journeys, which he reworked later, sometimes as plates for his travel books; as an illustrator of Alfred Tennyson's poems. As an author, he is known principally for his popular nonsense collections of poems, songs, short stories, botanical drawings, recipes, and alphabets. He also composed and published twelve musical settings of Tennyson's poetry.

For a full biography see part 1, and for earlier works see parts 1 - 16 also.

This is part 17 of 21- part series on the works of Edward Lear.


1871 Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany and Alphabets printed/published by Watson and Hazell for Robert John Bush:

Front Cover

Title Page

The Owl and the Pussy-Cat

Nonsense Botany:

Baccopipia Gracilis

Bottlephorkia Spoonifolia

Cockatooca Superba

Fishia Marina

Guittara Pensilis

Manypeeplia Upsidownia original artwork

Manypeeplia Upsidownia

Barkia Howlaloudia

Enkkopia Chickabiddia

Shoebootia Utilis

Phattfacia Stupenda

Piggiwiggia Pyramidalis

Plumbunnia Nutritiosa

Pollybirdia Singularis

For comparison - one of Lear's botanical studies from around the same time:

1870 A Flowering Plant
pen and brown ink on blue writing paper 24.9 x 18.7 cm
The Morgan Library and Museum, New York City

Nonsense Alphabet 1:

Nonsense Alphabet 2: