The New York Times Book Review A Gorey Christmas December 2, 1990 RARE

RARE. I haven't found another one that has sold. I have had this copy since 1990.

"When The Book Review asked Edward Gorey to create the drawings for many of the features in this holiday issue, we asked him to include two extra pictures that would challenge the imaginations of some of our best storytellers. Nine writers rose to the occasion.

I just couldn't explain this bleak and stylish Christmas picture. I thought that I would ask my wife. Laurie said, "That must be the White House." I didn't think so, though looking at the inexpressive little windows I could imagine a kind of free-market detachment at the height of the shopping season, a waiting period to see how the Christmas tree would play. I next tried my 10-year-old daughter, Annie. She said it was simple; the people were letting the alligator hang his ornament ahead of everybody else to make him feel better about being removed from his accustomed habitat, namely Florida. And last year, when the alligator had been required to take his place in line, he had eaten the tree. Now I was getting ideas. I was beginning to see a kind of repressed merriment on the face of the reptile; only good manners keep him from eating this tree too and, because you're only as good as your last picture, turning on the people waiting to hang their ornaments. The avoided eye contact that gives this Christmas scene its characteristic tone seems, we agree, very New York and very much to the obscure purposes of a highly focused individual like the alligator."

Format: Newspaper

Pages: 84

Copyright: December 2, 1990

Publisher: The New York Times

Condition: Good with overall tanning. Back half of back page is missing. Tear in page 3 - 4. Middle fold mark across all pages.

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