It is not unusual for writers’ correspondence to be collected in a volume of its own. It is far rarer to see a preserved correspondence where the envelopes are the main attraction. Yet in From Ted to Tom it is the envelopes and their adornments by Edward “Ted” Gorey (1925-2000)—the Chicago-born writer and artist famed for his self-illustrated books, including The Doubtful Guest (1957)—that make for a surprisingly moving read.
In Mark Dery’s biography Born to Be Posthumous: The Eccentric Life and Mysterious Genius of Edward Gorey (2018), he argued that Gorey’s letters are vital to understanding his inner life, for within them he “confides his anxieties, his insecurities, his enduring passions, his everyday pleasures, his philosophies of life and art”. And while, in the preface to From Ted to Tom, Gorey’s friend and correspondent Tom Fitzharris explains that this new volume includes only excerpts from the 50 letters he received between 1974 and 1975, nonetheless they leave an impact—especially when taken in tandem with the trademark surreal illustrations inspired by, among others, the English illustrator and “nonsense” writer Edward Lear (1812-88), which grace the front, and sometimes back, of these envelopes.
Most of the illustrations here contain a pair of dogs, each wearing clothing that features a large “T”, presumably representing Gorey and Fitzharris. One of the small delights of reading From Ted to Tom is seeing the slight but significant variations in the design of these dogs, including font changes in which the “Ts” are inscribed. Gorey also places the dogs in intriguing situations. In one, they are standing on swings tethered to an especially wild-looking tree or running and waving long banners on which Fitzharris’s name and address are written. There are moments of comedy, as when the two dogs attempt to balance a massive watermelon on their backs while wearing roller skates.
Among the letters shared in this book there are a handful of quotes taken from writers and books Gorey found interesting, as well as wry observations on the arts more broadly: “The middle of the first movement of the Sibelius Fourth is even more splendidly mushy than the background music for Wuthering Heights, which it strongly resembles. This is known as Music Appreciation.” Other turns of phrase could serve as epigrams in a different context: “Do you feel M. Proust ever tells you anything that you didn’t know before? This is a serious question.”
Witty annotations
As the correspondence proceeds, Gorey adds tactile elements to his designs. The 40th envelope finds one of the dogs balanced atop a classical column, throwing discs labelled with “La Vie” and “L’Art” into a cloud annotated “L’Obscurité”. Turn over the envelope and the second dog appears sitting in a boat, envelope in hand: it is one of a few instances where a tangible sense of loneliness leaps off the page. From Ted to Tom features memorably self-effacing moments too, for example when attention is drawn to an inkblot on the back of one envelope using an arrow and the caption “Mess, not mystery”. Later, an abstract image is given the witty title: “Inadvertent drawing (ink and water colour)”.
Fitzharris writes that although their friendship dwindled, Gorey was “always funny, always cordial” when their paths crossed in the years that followed. (In his biography of Gorey, Dery calls Fitzharris his subject’s “last, great crush”.) And in the longer correspondence reproduced here, we sense how much this friendship meant to Gorey: something Fitzharris’s endnotes help to clarify.
The 26th envelope is one of the rare instances with no dogs in sight. Instead, Gorey illustrated a group of nervous children waiting in a dark room, with leaves adorning the wallpaper and rugs, meticulously rendered in black and white, while on the back of the envelope Gorey has drawn a single falling red leaf. Fitzharris notes that this leaf “is the same color as the leaf I’d picked up as Ted and I hiked down the Flume Gorge in the White Mountains in New Hampshire on Saturday, October 19, 1974”: a very specific reference, which speaks volumes about Gorey’s habit of zeroing in on a particular detail. From Ted to Tom is a charming addition to Gorey’s bibliography, but it is also a moving chronicle of one very particular friendship.
• Tom Fitzharris (ed.), From Ted to Tom: The Illustrated Envelopes of Edward Gorey, New York Review Books, 248pp, illustrated throughout, $24.95 (hb),
published 4 February
• Tobias Carroll is the author of five books, including Political Sign (2020) and the novel In the Sight (2024)
