LEAR, Edward

When you consider how wary contemporary editors are of any writing faintly unclear, it is amazing that this Victorian writer had such encouraging publishers, prompting him to produce several editions of A Book of Nonsense (1845), A Book of Nonsense and More Nonsense (1862), Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany and Alphabets (1871), More Nonsense, Pictures, Rhymes, Botany, Etc. (1872), and Laughing Lyrics, a Fresh Book of Nonsense Poems (1877), which, all would agree, is a ridiculous bibliography for an...