Edward Lear: poetry of the absurd

Edward Lear (1812 - 1888) - English artist, musician and poet, who continued the original English folk tradition of creating short "meaningless" poems.

Brief information from childhood and adolescence

The Lyraw family was big, it can even be said, huge. Edward Lear was the youngest. In four years, his sister Ann was taken to her, who was twenty-one years older than he. Anne became his mother and lived with him until her death, when she was fifty years old. From adolescence, he had to earn bread. He first painted signs and advertisements, then began to make illustrations for zoological books. He painted countless different animals, especially many of his parrots. Lear has become a very serious ornithological draftsman. The first publication of his watercolors with parrots came out when the artist was 19 years old.

In the estate of Knowsley Hall

The Earl of Derby kept a large menagerie in his estate. He cherished the ambitious idea of publishing a book about him. At the age of 21, Edward Lear was invited to make drawings of animals, and there was revealed his talent, which turned out to be a holiday for all the children who surrounded him. He painted for them pictures, which were accompanied by amusing verses-impromptu.

Recommendations of doctors

Four years Edward Lear was at the count's estate, but his health was weak. He himself was a man of grace and fragility. He had weak lungs, bronchitis and asthma constantly disturbed him, in addition, he suffered from epilepsy. His attacks he learned to foresee and always retired.

In addition, he had bouts of depression. All together, but especially the lungs, led the doctors to the idea that the winter of 1847-1848 would be the last for him if he did not leave England. That's how he left his native country and moved to warm places, more precisely, to Italy.

Italy and other countries

In this warm country, he began to paint landscapes. Edward sold his drawings and watercolors to individuals and publishers, because in those days interest in distant countries was great, and there were still no photos. And in the course were illustrated books about travel.

Despite all his illnesses, he was an avid traveler. The artist traveled all over the Mediterranean, all the islands of the Aegean Sea, Greece, Italy, Palestine, was on Mount Athos, in Egypt. He even reached India and Ceylon.

And from everywhere Lear brought a huge number of drawings and published books. In 1846, an illustrated trip to Italy was published in two volumes . He was then 34 years old. And in the same year he published his first book of nonsense. This is such a bibliographic rarity that it is not even in the British Library. It was, as they say, read out, so it was a success. And in the same year they became interested in the English queen. She asked Edward Lear to teach her how to draw. And he gave 12 lessons to the queen, who was still young: she was not on the throne for ten years (she ascended the throne in 1837). Experts say that after the lessons with Lear her drawings have improved.

He always retained the desire to draw. He even illustrated Tennyson's poems.

Limericks

What are they? How is the poem of Edward Lear formed? He did not invent Limerick. It was a long English tradition. This is an old form that dates back to the 16th century songs. They not only sang, but they danced in Shakespeare's times, and later. In print, they were sold at fairs and just on the street, often with notes. Limerick consists of five lines. Two long and two short, and the last one is long again. Its plot is as follows:

• Exposition. An old man from the city of "N".
• Act. What did he chop, this old man.
• Effects. What did they tell him that he responded to this or that they did to him?

The Prince of Nepal. The first two lines describe the departure of the prince on the ship. The action is that he fell from the ship. And the consequences and conclusion are simple - what has fallen, then disappeared. This was the answer of the embassy. Each limerick was accompanied by a graphic drawing by the author.

But the "An old man on the border," who deftly danced with a cat and drank tea from his hat. Retelling it is meaningless. And the picture for him became a classic, like the whole legacy of Lear.

What is the charm of the Limerick heroes?

The hero of the limericks can commit stupid things and constantly does it, but he is bound by the rhyme and rules of the game, which he himself assumed. What kind of drama occurs, in essence, in these limericks?

There, except for the old man who commits absurd acts, there are also surrounding sensible sober people who, as a rule, do not like what he does. They ostracized him, expelled him from his city, mocked him and even simply beat him.

Aldous Huxley wrote about it very well: it is about them, about others, that we are talking first. In fact, there is nothing surprising in them, law-abiding, though close-minded. Naturally, they are amazed at what this old man is doing. People ask questions that may seem out of place. In fact, the Limerick are nothing more than episodes of the eternal struggle of genius or eccentricity with loved ones and others. That's what happens in Limerick actually.

Before you is a self-portrait of Lear with an unknown person who claims that no Lear exists. Edward Lear shows him the lining of his hat with a name.

Edward Lear: Creativity

During his life, many Limerick wrote Edward Lear. His books also include songs and ballads. Here is an example of his ballad and limerick at the same time. It is called the "Table and chair". We serve it as prose, but retaining the rhymes.

The old chair said to the table: "I'm tired of standing in a corner, I'm tired of being locked up in the life of a dull news. It smells in the summer outside the window, we'll run away together with you: on the boulevards rustle, with a fresh wind to breathe. " The table answers the chair: "I would go with you, brother, but I'm not a mastaka, I know how to stand." "Nothing," exclaimed the chair, "I would still risk it, because we are not given nothing for nothing, they are strong and slender." What a miracle! Here's a surprise: the table and chair went down, and hobbled in a row, uncertainly at first. And then, more cheerfully, past the shops and churches, galloped off like a horse, skok and skok. But behind the river, behind the bridge, they began to think that later. It's good to go home, but where, the way is unknown! "Duck, duck, dear friend, mouse in the grass and black beetle, point the way straight, take us home." Duck with a mouse and a beetle led them straight to the house, where they were waiting for dinner. They began to eat scrambled eggs, and singing and joking on the full stomachs of the song, dancing to the dope, and giving out the duck.

In comments this charm does not need.

Musicality Lear

Edward Lear was a wonderful musician. He was loved, he had many friends everywhere. He sat down to the piano (by the way, no one taught him, Lear learned himself) and began to perform different songs, for example, on the verses of Alfred Tennyson, the most famous poet of that time. And Tennyson himself, a man rather unsociable and gloomy, admitted that of all the musical transcriptions of his poems, he could only hear Leer's songs, everything else would not do.

At the end of his life, Lear settled in a villa in San Remo. He never married, having lived a bachelor all his life. There Edward died and is buried there in San Remo. A life full of work and travel, lived Edward Lear. Biography in our presentation is over.