Mr. Lear: A Life of Art and Nonsense
Before the nonsense verse, Lear painted parrots at twenty and hid his epilepsy for life. Uglow gives the ornithologist and the limerick-writer equal standing.
Edward Lear was a serious ornithological painter before he was the author of nonsense verse, and Uglow gives both lives their due: the parrot lithographs made at twenty, the epilepsy he hid all his life, the restless travel, and the limericks that outlived everything else he did.
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Maria Popova
Jenny Uglow — one of my favorite custodians of cultural hindsight — describes his process in her magnificent biography Mr. Lear: A Life of Art and Nonsense (public library)
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