Lear’s life was as troubled as any of his more gothic contemporaries. The twentieth child in a family of twentyone, he suffered from epilepsy from an early age. His condition filled him with shame and inhibited his social interactions and stunted his self-worth for the rest of his life. Having moved out of the crowded family home at a young age, Lear was already drawing for money by the time he was sixteen, developing a passion for the animal kingdom that would feed into much of his later work.
It is perhaps for his poem The Owl and the Pussycat that Lear is best known, a prime example of the “Nonsense” sub-genre that he pioneered. Replying to the ardent protestations of love from his friend the Owl, the Pussycat replies, “How charmingly sweet you sing!/ O let us be married! too long we have tarried:/ But what shall we do for a ring?”
It is for lines like these that Lear’s poetry is often overlooked as works of childish simplicity and viewed almost as nursery rhymes rather than works of literature. However, there is much beauty to be found in Lear’s work, despite the fantastical nature of his tales. There has been much speculation over his sexuality, with many biographers arguing that Lear was gay. There is a pain implicit in much of his work, hidden behind a veil of frivolity.
An apparently superficial poem like The Owl and the Pussycat hides a tale wherein lovers, seemingly without a specific gender, sail away from their home in search of a land in which they can marry after years of apparent struggle. Perhaps I am guilty of reading too much into this particular poem. However, many advocates of Lear’s work have begun to stress the importance of the writer’s life in his work. Writing in The Telegraph earlier this month, Peter Swaab remarked that in his poetry Lear was essentially “keeping the lid on desperation by making a joke of it.”
Whether or not we can view the owl and the pussycat as star-crossed lovers, we can certainly view them as creations with meaning beyond that of their surface tale. So perhaps this year, alongside Bleak House or David Copperfield, there will be readers out there who reach for Edward Lear and discover a true depth in the work of a brilliant and tortured man.