Biography – Edward
Lear (1812-1888)
Edward
Lear was a man of many talents: illustrator,
landscape painter, travel writer, and poet. But it
is for his
talent as a writer
of nonsense rhymes—known today as limericks—that he
is best remembered
by generation after generation of children. Before the works of Lear and Lewis
Carroll were published, most literature written for children
was full of "commonsense",
and was intended to provide moral or didactic instruction.
Lear's limericks, on the other
hand, could perhaps be said
to be the
Victorian version of
today's cartoon series, where everyday "commonsense" was put to one
side, and "nonsense"
was allowed to run riot.
It is mainly
thanks to Edward
Lear that the limerick
is still so popular,
more than a hundred years after his
death, not only in English-speaking countries, but in many other countries
too.
Edward Lear – artist and writer
Edward
Lear was born in Highgate, England in 1812.
He was the twentieth
(!) child of Jeremiah Lear,
a London stockbroker, and his
wife Ann. Soon after Edward was born, his father
lost most of his money, and the family had
to adapt to a much lower
standard of living. At the age of six, Lear began to suffer
from bouts of epilepsy, and a few years later he began to experience
periods of acute depression. He continued to suffer from
these and other health problems for the rest
of his life.
For
much of his childhood, Lear was brought up and educated by his elder
sister Ann. It was thanks to
her that Lear was introduced to both classical
and modern literature, especially poetry, and to drawing. Already
at the age of 15, he
sold his poems
and drawings to earn some money.
As
a young man, Lear began to earn
his living by illustrating scientific books on birds,
and later on he became a landscape painter. In fact,
he became so well-known that he was asked
to give drawing
lessons to Queen Victoria herself! All the same,
Lear's success as a
landscape painter was rather short-lived, and he gradually became disillusioned by the lack
of interest in his work.
Edward Lear lived
at the same time as
another famous writer, Lewis Carroll, best known for Alice in Wonderland and other books written for
children. Both of these writers lived
during the Victorian age. Although most people
probably think of the literature written during this period as rather serious and solemn, there were
also writers who produced very
light-hearted and entertaining
works, among them Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll. (Illustration
from Alice in Wonderland)
Poems
and limericks by Edward
Lear
The
first edition of A Book of Nonsense was published in 1846, and
was a collection of both old limericks
and new ones composed by Lear himself. Two further editions
were published in
1855 and
1861. Lear also wrote travel books that
he illustrated himself, had books of his
paintings published,
and exhibited his own
work at exhibitions
in England. The Owl
and the Pussycat was the first
of his nonsense songs to be
published, in 1867.
Nonsense
writing
Both Lewis
Carroll
and Edward Lear are representatives of a special kind of writing that became
very popular during
the Victorian age
and was known as nonsense literature. Lear
published his first
Book of Nonsense, a
collection of limericks for children, in 1846.
Lear actually referred to his own
poems as "nonsense,
pure and absolute". In fact, Lear himself never used the
term "limerick", but called his
poems nonsense rhymes. The term
"limerick" did not actually become
popular until around
the time of Lear's death, and exactly how this name
came into use is still a mystery
to this day.
The
limerick (as we call it today),
or a form very similar to it, had already
existed for several hundred years before Lear produced A Book of Nonsense, and some books containing limericks had already
been printed before Lear's time. What made his
books so popular, however, were the size
of the collections
and the novel style of Lear's illustrations.
Although
he was born in England, Lear actually spent most of his
adult life
travelling abroad, particularly to the Mediterranean
countries. On his travels he drew landscapes and animals, particularly birds. In fact,
one of Brazil's rarest birds was
named after him! This happened
after Lear, on a trip to Brazil,
happened to paint it, not
realising that he was painting a species that until
then had not been identified!
He
eventually bought some land and built
a house in San Remo in Italy,
where he died in
1888 at the age of
75.
-Edward
Lear's nonsense rhymes—comic relief for earnest Victorians
If you have read our
text on Oscar Wilde,
you may remember
that the quality of earnestness was a trademark of Victorian society. Victorian children were therefore brought up very strictly, and their education did not
leave much room for humour
or laughter. Can you imagine, therefore, what a joy and relief it must
have been for them to
read such poems, where the
most absurd, not to mention
impossible, situations were brought to
life— not only in the form
of rhymes, but also in the form
of Lear's comical drawings? Queen Victoria
As you will see
from the poems we have
chosen to publish, many of them begin with
the phrase "There was an
old man from…".
This was Lear's way of poking
fun at grownups, to make them
look absurd—something that must have delighted
the children of his day. You
will also notice that many
of Lear's subjects had long noses
or beards, and big eyes. Nonsense
rhymes were not just enjoyed
by children, however. Adults also found Lear's
books a welcome relief from the
restrictive teachings of the Church of England
and from Victorian society in general.
http://www.skoletorget.no/abb/eng/lear/pdf/bio.pdf
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