1961 - A Busy Year For Edward Gorey

One wonders how Edward Gorey got so much work done at this point in his career. He had to have kept extra large ink bottles and stacks of illustration board on hand in his tiny New York apartment to get through as much artwork as he did during the next decade. In 1961, books illustrated by Mr. Gorey included Quake, Quake, Quake: A Leaden Volume of English Verse by Paul Dehn; The Man Who Sang the Sillies by John Ciardi, Scrap Irony by Felicia Lamport, The Comic Looking Glass by Hart Leavitt, and The Rats of Rutland Grange by Edmund Wilson (printed in a magazine, this work was later published as a separate book). In addition to these fully illustrated books, Gorey provided cover drawings for several books, spot illustrations for a few magazines, was still working at Looking Glass Library, and published his own books The Fatal Lozenge, The Hapless Child and The Curious Sofa with Obolensky! Mr. Gorey said it could take two months or more to illustrate one of his own books after he got the writing done. He worked on his drawings mainly in the mornings and would then go out and about during the day for meals, to visit friends, go to movies and attend theatrical events. Since 1957, he had also been attending every single performance of the New York City Ballet. Throughout the 1960's, Mr. Gorey would continue to keep up and incredible pace, producing innumerable drawings, illustrations and complete books. It is no wonder he said that he practiced "crosshatching as a way of life"!