Hofer, Philip. 1967. Edward Lear as a landscape draughtsman. Cambridge: Mass., Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Michael's books have been translated into many languages including Chinese, Bulgarian and Hungarian, Hebrew and Japanese. He travels all over the UK and abroad talking to children, telling his stories and encouraging them to tell theirs. Owls John Gould, Edward Lear, Archibald Thorburn, John James Audubon and Alexander Wilson Natural History Museum Library / Wordsworth Editions

Rootling through the offerings in a print shop one, day, he bought some 19th-century prints of the birds he had seen. "One of them was a toucan, and I noticed it was signed E Lear. It didn't occur to me that it was the same chap who wrote The Owl and The Pussycat, though I soon realised that it was. And these were some of the finest, the prints done by Lear. As good, if not better than, any of the others."Lear’s 1829 drawings were used for wood engravings in the small two-volume work The Gardens and Menagerie of the Zoological Society Delineated. Visitors could wander along gravelled paths, past animal houses and ponds full of wildfowl, and see kangaroos and llamas, monkeys and bears and even a hippopotamus, not seen in Europe since the Romans. But while the Zoological Society gloried in these trophies of empire, it also stressed Britain’s civilising mission: the most ferocious animals, it claimed, were milder when bred in captivity. According to a children’s guide the zoo’s animals were “not only beautiful but happy … gentle, tender, compassionate, sympathising and benevolent, or at least innocent, like the best, and like the fairest, among ourselves”. And every time I saw him after that he would say: ‘Lear’s such an interesting character, and no one’s done a book on this subject, and I think you’re the right one to do it.’ And so it was David who encouraged me to write this book.” Andrew Wilton & Anne Lyles, The Great Age of British Watercolours (1750–1880), p. 318, 1993, Prestel, ISBN 3-7913-1254-5 Meyer, Susan E. A Treasury of the Great Children’s Book Illustrators. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1987.

Illustrated Excursions in Italy (1842–47) [ edit ] Temple of Venus and Roma, Rome Engraving of Celano Lear was already drawing “for bread and cheese” by the time he was aged 16 and soon developed into a serious “ornithological draughtsman” employed by the Zoological Society and then from 1832-36 by the Earl of Derby, who had a private menagerie. His first publication, published when he was 19, was Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots in 1830. His paintings were well received and he was favourably compared with Audubon. Lear’s self-portrait in verse, How Pleasant to know Mr. Lear, closes with this stanza, a reference to his own mortality: One of his ambitions has been to promote the significant British connection and heritage of the island – which arose uniquely because of the long British Protectorate of the Ionian Islands. This has involved work with the British press, radio and television; recently he appeared with Joanna Lumley in the very successful ITV documentary Greek Odyssey. He added: "The point about them is that these plates have very strong requirements. They have to be accurate. They have to show the male and the female. They have to pose the bird in such a way that its diagnostic characteristics, those that tell you it's this toucan, not that toucan, must be shown. And you may think that those technical restrictions are so severe that fine art goes out of the window.Strachie, Lady Constance Braham. Later Letters of Edward Lear: Author of "The Book of Nonsense." 1911: Duffield and Company. P. 332

Cox, Michael, ed. (2004). The Concise Oxford Chronology of English Literature. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-860634-6. Edward Lear, who showed an early interest in drawing the natural world, came to Knowsley through a fortuitous connection with the 13th Earl of Derby. In June 1830, Lear applied to the Zoological Society of London to request permission to draw from their collection of parrots, with a view to publishing his own book Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae. Lord Stanley, later 13th Earl of Derby, who as a young man had begun to collect natural history books and drawings, happened to chair the meeting where this application was approved.Public Domain https://www.illustrationhistory.org/illustrations/macrocercus-aracanga-red-and-yellow-maccaw Additional Resources Lear travelled for three years in Italy from 1837 and published two volumes of illustrations, Illustrated Excursions in Italy, the first of many such books. Lear briefly gave drawing lessons to Queen Victoria, who had been pleased by the Excursions and summoned him to court, leading to some awkward incidents when he failed to observe proper court protocol. Lear then returned to the Mediterranean, wishing to illustrate all points along the coast of that sea. That friend, of 30 years standing, was Attenborough: “I was at his house for dinner and I said ‘That’s the most beautiful painting of a possum I’ve ever seen. Who did it?’ And he said it was Edward Lear, and that nobody knows he was also an amazing and very important painter in natural history subjects. Gleanings from the Menagerie and Aviary at Knowsley Hall (Knowsley, U.K.: Privately printed, 1846).

Lear received little, if any, formal education. Ann tutored him at home and encouraged a talent for drawing and painting that he had early exhibited. When Jeremiah Lear retired and moved south of London in 1828, Edward and Ann remained in the city, taking up lodgings off the Gray’s Inn Road. The 16-year-old Lear supported them by selling miscellaneous sketches; he soon moved on to anatomical drawings and then to illustrations for natural history books. His skill in this latter capacity led to the publication in 1832 of a volume of 12 folio lithographic prints of parrots, Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae. This volume brought him to the attention of Edward Stanley, later 13th earl of Derby, who wanted an artist to draw the animals in his menagerie at Knowsley, the Derby estate in Lancashire. Lear accepted Stanley’s offer of residency at Knowsley Hall while the work was in progress; he stayed there off and on from 1832 to 1837. Lear suffered from lifelong health afflictions. From the age of six he suffered frequent grand mal epileptic seizures, and bronchitis, asthma, and during later life, partial blindness. Lear experienced his first seizure at a fair near Highgate with his father. The event scared and embarrassed him. Lear felt lifelong guilt and shame for his epileptic condition. His adult diaries indicate that he always sensed the onset of a seizure in time to remove himself from public view. When Lear was about seven years old he began to show signs of depression, possibly due to the instability of his childhood. He suffered from periods of severe melancholia which he referred to as "the Morbids." Lear was already drawing "for bread and cheese" by the time he was aged 16 and soon developed into a serious "ornithological draughtsman" employed by the Zoological Society and from 1832 to 1836 by the Earl of Derby, who kept a private menagerie at his estate, Knowsley Hall. He was the first major bird artist to draw birds from real live birds, instead of skins. Lear's first publication, published when he was 19 years old, was Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots in 1830. [9] One of the greatest ornithological artists of his era, he taught Elizabeth Gould whilst also contributing to John Gould's works and was compared by some to the naturalist John James Audubon. After his eyesight deteriorated too much to work with such precision on the fine drawings and etchings of plates used in lithography, he turned to landscape painting and travel. [10] Lear was known to introduce himself with a long pseudonym: "Mr Abebika kratoponoko Prizzikalo Kattefello Ablegorabalus Ableborinto phashyph" or "Chakonoton the Cozovex Dossi Fossi Sini Tomentilla Coronilla PolentillaDerek E. Johns THE EDWARD LEAR SOCIETY ADVISORY COUNCIL Founders Count Spiro Flamburiari & Derek Johns Advisory Council