“Since they were orphans and there was no one to stop them, they were often merry far into the night” until an incident leads to the ‘Rabbit’s Restroom’. The Deranged Cousins are Rose Marshmary, Mary Rosemarsh and Marsh Maryrose, who all live together in a rose-covered house at the edge of a marsh. It’s the alphabetical story of A, “an author who went for a walk” who appears to be Gorey himself in the fur coat that he always wore, ending with Z, “the zither he left to the maid.” The Osbick Bird is the tale of Emblus Fingby and a bird that adopts him as a loyal companion: “The years passed by in pressing weeds / And making bell-pulls out of beads.” There are two versions of The Chinese Obelisks, a sketch form and the finished version. The Iron Tonic, or A Winter Afternoon in a Lonely Valley is set near a sanatorium: “The people at the grey hotel, / Are either aged or unwell” which has some unusual features: “It’s known the skating pond conceals / A family of enormous eels”.

The Gilded Bat concerns a talented girl who grows up to be a prima ballerina: “After Federjenska did a grand jeté into the wings one matinee and was never seen again, Maud took over.” 37 pen nib, a glass marble, two buttons, a half-inch thumbtack, and an evil piece of knotted string. The Evil Garden is filled with carnivorous vegetation: “Alexa watches while her Aunt / Is pulled feet first inside a plant.” The Inanimate Tragedy is a drama featuring pins and needles, a heroic No. The Pious Infant is sanctimonious Henry Clump, who concerns himself with the salvation of every soul he meets until the day he encounters a widow in the snow. The Nursery Frieze features a black Capybara-esque creature speaking multi-syllabic words such as ‘antigropelos’, ‘ophicleide’ and ‘sparadrap’. The Beastly Baby concerns the fate of an infant “capable of making only two sorts of noises, both of them nasty”. Most of the individual titles are rearranged from their original book layouts to fit the larger pages, but are otherwise unaltered. It collects twenty of his small, intense works in one large volume.

Amphigorey Too is a second selection from the vast back catalogue of the incredibly prolific, hugely influential Edward Gorey.

Amphigorey too