YMMV / Edward Gorey

• Angst? What Angst?: Neville MacFizzet is barely fazed by the death of his family at the end of The Dwindling Party.
• Awesome Art: Gorey's artwork, of cross-hatchings rendering sinister figures and events, is wonderfully skilled and atmospheric. Bonus to him having had little professional training.
• Cult Classic: Gorey's work started to gain a small cult following around the 1970s and 1980s as a result of his work on the 1977 Broadway play of Dracula, though his books were still rather obscure at the time. The fact that Edward had at best mixed feelings about his growing fame didn't help this, as he was always reluctant when asked to attend events promoting his work. By the time of his death in 2000, his popularity seemed to plateau. The popularity of his work steadily began to grow again around the time of the release of the biography Born to Be Posthumous in 2018.
• Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory: Gorey's work is heavily subject to this. Although, he has shown indifference to all interpretations as he believes that what you see is what you get, when it comes to his work.
• Friendly Fandoms: Edward Gorey fans tend to get along pretty well with the Moomin fanbase, primarily because its creator, Tove Jansson, took some inspiration from his cross-hatching in her later works, and because the work of both tend to be surreal in nature, and sometimes downright dark.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Gorey's work is considerably more popular in Japan than in his own home country, to the point where one website dedicated to his work has an entire page on it. This is understandable given that Gorey was heavily influenced by Japanese Literature, plus a lot of his cross-hatching and his artstyle is reminiscent of that found in many Japanese mangas. He also has large followings in Germany and Spain.
• Misaimed Fandom: Some Edward Gorey fans misinterpret the deaths of children in some of his books to mean that he outright dislikes them. In actuality, Gorey had no such feelings towards children, or any feelings for that matter. Much like he does towards almost everyone else, he holds no particular fondness towards them, positive or negative. Though he has been known to get along pretty well with the kids of his friends, and said kids were said to have enjoyed his company.
• Moral Event Horizon: Whenever someone harms an animal in any of Gorey's work, they've already passed it.
• Obscure Popularity: Most people have seen his illustrations somewhere, especially on books he hasn't written.
• Paranoia Fuel: If you think about the book too deeply, many of the scenes from The Gashlycrumb Tinies fit this to a tee, especially for parents.
• Spiritual Successor: Many, from Tim Burton to Junji Ito.
• What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: The trouble and violence in The Bug Book, the child-eating monster that is The Wuggly Ump, the obscure words in The Nursery Frieze...
  • Gorey got this response from publishers when he tried to classify The Doubtful Guest as such. Ironically, it's one of his few books that really is appropriate for kids.

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