A Book of Nonsense

by Mervyn Peake, Maeve Gilmore

A collection of illustrated nonsensical poems from the celebrated author and illustrator of the Gormenghast Trilogy.

Genres: Poetry, Fiction, Humor

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Mervyn Laurence Peake was an English modernist writer, artist, poet and illustrator. He is best known for what are usually referred to as the Gormenghast books, though the Titus books would be more accurate: the three works that exist were the beginning of what Peake conceived as a lengthy cycle, following his protagonist Titus Groan from cradle to grave, but Peake's untimely death prevented completion of the cycle, which is now commonly but erroneously referred to as a trilogy. They are sometimes compared to the work of his older contemporary J.R.R. Tolkien, but his surreal fiction was influenced by his early love for Charles Dickens and Robert Louis Stevenson rather than Tolkien's studies of mythology and philology.

Peake also wrote poetry and literary nonsense in verse form, short stories for adults and children ("Letters from a Lost Uncle"), stage and radio plays, and Mr Pye, a relatively tightly-structured novel in which God implicitly mocks the evangelical pretensions and cosy world-view of the eponymous hero.

Peake first made his reputation as a painter and illustrator during the 1930s and 1940s, when he lived in London, and he was commissioned to produce portraits of well-known people. A collection of these drawings is still in the possession of his family. Although he gained little popular success in his lifetime, his work was highly respected by his peers, and his friends included Dylan Thomas and Graham Greene. His works are now included in the collections of the National Portrait Gallery and the Imperial War Museum.

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why, when I already have two editions of this book (not to mention Complete Nonsense), do I need a third? Because:

i) This has 12 previously unpublished Peake sketches on glossy paper;
ii) I have Christmas and birthday book tokens nagging to be used;
iii) I am cursed by the collecting bug.

Perhaps, only maybe and possibly perhaps, I might divest myself of one of the other editions when I have my next library rationalisation.

In the meantime, I shall enjoy re-reading some of my favourite poems and will bask in the Technicolour glow of the illustration of Uncle Jake, who became a snake but never found it out and, as no one mentions it, one sees him still about.

Eight-Years-Later Update: Next library rationalisation under way: no copies being got rid of.

[Kyle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not typically a fan of nonsense verse, and have never really preferred it as a poetic art form. Yet, if anyone could make me enjoy nonsense verse, Mervyn Peake could.

Peake is like a child playing in a sandbox, letting the sand run through his fingers, getting portions wet to make shapes out of, and making incredible sand castles. Peake likes to use words for pleasure, and has the skills to make them work masterfully.

His enthusiasm for his own wordplay is infectious, and makes even a stickler of sense like me appreciate the beauty of nonsense.

[Cecily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nonsence* isn't a genre of which I'm especially fond, but combined with Peake's drawings, this is a delightful collection.

There is considerable variety: some are very short, while others are longer, narrative poems. Many are illustrated in Peake's inimitable style, and his way with words is given full rein, with a smattering of invented ones, and odd rhymes, such as "horrible" and "deplorable".

There are a few links to other works, most notably, "It Worries me to Know", whose final line is "Across the roofs of Gormenghast".

Pirates have a mention, of course. The poem "Of Pygmies, Palms and Pirates" lists lots of apparently random things and ends that of these things, "I have no more to say", which perhaps makes it some sort of post-modern meta non-something.

Generally, I prefer fantastical creatures and paradoxes to outright nonsence, and these are present, e.g. "I saw all of a sudden \ No sign of any ship."

My favourite poem in this collection is "I cannot give the Reasons", for its imagery; here are the third and fifth/final verses:

“In gorgery and gushness
and all that's squishified
My voice has all the lushness
of what I can't abide.
...
Among the antlered mountains
I make my viscous way
and watch the sepia fountains
throw up their lime-green spray.”

Others that stood out for me were "The Trouble with Geraniums", which is fairly traditional nonsence, and the formulaic (but funny) "Aunts and Uncles" ("When Uncle/Aunty X became a Y...").

The most surprising piece is a draft of a narrative poem, "The Adventures of Footfruit". It is about non-conformity in a totalitarian state (echoes of Gormenghast - or am I looking too hard?), subliminal advertising to stoke consumer demand, and where "Priests are the salesmen to whom one confesses not owning".

This edition has recent forewords (2011) by his son, Sebastian, and ranting poet, Benjamin Zephaniah, as well as the original introduction by his wife, Maeve. Maeve mentions Peake's love of The Diary of a Nobody, saying it "overjoyed his permanent sense of the ridiculous, but he was not immune to the perfections of Jane Austen, the world she presented being equally ridiculous, only more proper". I'm not sure what Janeites would say to that!

Peake defended this to critics, saying “Madness can be lovely when it’s the madness of the imagination and not the madness of pathology”. Tragically, he was to become familiar with the latter.

All My Peake Reviews

All my Peake/Gormenghast reviews (including biographies/memoirs and books about his art) are on a shelf,
HERE.

*Spelling note: In his own writings, Peake always misspelt it nonsence. In this review, I’ve chosen to do likewise.

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Get serious, read this book of amazing verse to soon realise how relative the word nonsense is. Going by Mervyn Peake's wife, Maeve Gilmore, in her brief introduction, Mervyn Peake was inspired to write A Book of Nonsense after reading an article in the News Chronicle of Sept. 1957, headed: SUB-THINK 'They're going to try it on us soon,' the article began, continuing: 'A company was recently formed in the United States with the blatant aim of taking hold of the human mind, without the owner's consent, much less his cooperation. The company is called the Subliminal Projection Corporation.' I think some journalist had been watching too much Twilight Zone.

Imagine the essay George Orwell would have written on the 'Subliminal Projection Corporation'.

[Damselindistress]

THE TROUBLE WITH GERANIUMS

The trouble with geraniums
is that they’re much too red!
The trouble with my toast is that
it’s far too full of bread.

The trouble with a diamond
is that it’s much too bright.
The same applies to fish and stars
and the electric light.

The troubles with the stars I see
lies in the way they fly.
The trouble with myself is all
self-centred in the eye.

The trouble with my looking-glass
is that it shows me, me;
there’s trouble in all sorts of things
where it should never be.

[Rhys · Rating 4 out of 5]

I still haven't got round to tackling the *Gormenghast* trilogy. It has been sitting on my shelves for more than 20 years... Maybe next year (or the year after; or the year after that) I'll give it a go. In the meantime I've decided to get back into reading Peake the easy way, through his 'lesser' works.

I've enjoyed Peake's poems ever since I read the anthology *Peake's Progress* many years ago (I didn't finish that book, I don't know why). I have to confess that I'm not really much of a poetry lover, but Peake's nonsense poems are certainly to my taste. Often compared with the amusing poems of Hilaire Belloc, I actually think Peake's efforts are superior.

Much of his imagery is genuinely strange. These poems are nonsensical but not devoid of sense (if that statement makes sense). One of my favourite pieces in this book is the very last, about a character called "Footfruit" who encapsulates the start of an unfinished satire against the advertising industry. Not really told as a poem, but not as a prose story, Footfruit's adventures are whimsically light and yet manage to be quite sinister too. Shame they break off so soon...

The next Peake book I'll tackle will be *Boy in Darkness and other stories*, which is a novella and a handful of short tales.

[Octavia Cade · Rating 3 out of 5]

The best part of this is far and away Peake's illustrations of his poems. A hugely talented artist, his sketches here are absolutely delightful. The poems themselves don't charm me in the same way, although my favourite of the bunch, "Aunts and Uncles", is pretty wonderful, what with poor old Aunty Mig turning into a warty flying pig and a very grumpy picture to match.

Fun but fairly lightweight, certainly not to the same level as some of Peake's astonishing prose - or even his other, non-nonsense poetry.

[Bryan D · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll be honest and say this is totally out of my comfort zone, I've rarely much time for poetry because I like a decent novel and as much as I've tried, I never really warmed to poetry.
Anyhow, this collection is bizarre, the illustration's great, there's a lovely little Gormenghast moment and my favourite excerpt was Aunts and Uncles.
I think it would be unfair to lower the star rating as there may be a lot of greatness in this collection it's just that it probably passed me by.
I felt it was sadly lacking the entertainment of writers like Edward Gorey and Dr.Seuss.

[Richard Clay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sometimes disturbing, sometimes hilarious, this little volume collects some of Peake's finest nonsense and is an ideal option for anyone who finds the scale of the doorstop/monolith Peake's Progress a bit intimidating. Peake wrote two - Titus Groan and Gormenghast - of perhaps only half a dozen novels by twentieth century English writers that simply must be read. So even if these intentionally silly verses were a bit of a sideline, they're still of considerable historical interest. And any failure to find 'Oh here it is...' funny means you should probably check your pulse

[Jenny · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked Tintinnabulum, particularly these parts:
"It was not me, for I am not
The tinkling type, I said,
I am a businessman, I've got
A bowler on my head

There is a sparkle in your eye,
A lightness in your tread
And your demeanour crisp and spry
Leaves nothing to be said"

And I was free! And now my goal
Is on a different plane
And I will never let my soul
Be rude to me again"

[Gretchen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of fantastical ("nonsense") poems by Mervyn Peake along with some of his drawings. It is a small book - wish it was larger. And I wish there were poems along the lines of Gormenghast, but it is a fun little collection.

[Cooper Renner · Rating 5 out of 5]

A superb collection.

[Ian Banks · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m not a huge fan of “nonsense” verse but I love Peake when he’s on form and he is superb for the most part here. A lovely range of poems for everyone from kids to quite-well-read adults.

[Siobhan Royle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I LOVE NONSENSE!!!!! and this stuff is spectacular, runcible, lovely, marzipan nonsense.

[Darren Goossens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review from http://darrengoossens.wordpress.com/2014/12/04/incomplete-nonsense-a-book-of-nonsense-by-mervyn-peake/

A Book of Nonsense by Mervyn Peake, Picador 1974, 91 pages (illustrated)

Mervyn Peake is in the canon because of his writing -- the Titus trilogy, (Titus Groan, Gormenghast and Titus Alone), often called the Gormenghast trilogy. I read them as a teenager, an impressionable age, and found them vivid and fascinating. The first two really form a single long novel, with the third a change of direction confounded by his creeping illness. Mr Pye is a lesser but lively read.

Cover of 1974 Picador edition of A Book of Nonsense

He was also renowned as an artist and particularly an illustrator. Poetry, usually rhyming verse, was also a fascination, and clearly the prose, the poetry and the drawing informed each other, supported each other, and enriched each other. This volume is a posthumous collection of nonsense rhymes, and shows off his rich and visual imagination well. It does not lie at the core of his contribution to literature, but perhaps brings us closer to the man than much of his other work because here he is at play. I confess I bought because it is by Peake and despite it being nonsense verse. If you are a fan of neither English nonsense verse nor Peake, there is nothing to see here.

The illustrations vary from quick sketches to careful illustrations that tie in to the stories, all the way to complete illustrated pages reproduced in facsimile, for example for 'O Here it is and there it is...' with its marvellous winged William pear.

'Turn over a fresh page my friend
And turn it over fast
For no one knows how soon may end
The foolscap of your past.
...

'I am your boat! I am your crew
Your rudder or your mast --
Your friend, I am your limpets too
And your elastoplast.'

(Tintinnabulum)

My issue is an old paperback on pretty coarse paper. I believe there is a more recent edition on slick paper with more drawings; such an issue would be far preferable. Some of the poems are reproduced on the official Peake website (http://www.mervynpeake.org/nonsense.html).

[Caitlin James · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast series showcases his sublime grasp of the English language: he manages to convey the intense gothic atmosphere using the minimum amount of fuss, and maximum humour possible, all the while keeping his ghastly characters at their ludicrous antics with polish and aplomb.

His poetry is far more precise than his novels. Before writing the Gormenghast stories Peake was an illustrator who drew for a variety of bizarre children’s’ books including Alice in Wonderland, The Hunting of the Snark and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. His love of surreal imagery and the macabre comes across beautifully in these nonsense poems which lie just beyond the realm of sense and yet are coherent enough to fully convey the plot or mood intended.

Though every word may be completely unrelated to the last, there is not one that is out of place. His phrasing and metre is utterly perfect and the poems sound far better if you recite them out loud in a ludicrously posh accent with rolled ‘r’s and over-enunciated consonants.

It is testament to Peake’s command of imigary and nuance that I enjoyed every single poem in A Book Of Nonsense. I introduced it to two other people who also loved it, laughed out loud, and then said “…what?!” at the end of every poem, just as I had the first time I read it.

These days I don’t lend it to anyone. It stays on my bookshelf nestled between The Thirteen Clocks and The Wonderful O and Scaramouche. I hope that fits.

[Robin Helweg-Larsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peake wrote these poems from age 26 to 46, years in which he was also an artist (including war artist), illustrator, and author of several books including the Gormenghast trilogy. His degenerative disease prevented him from finishing much of his work (including the third and further planned Gormenghast novels), and took a further decade to kill him.

Some of his nonsense poems are several pages long, some are short and coherent, some of them fail to complete. All are memorable, many are quotable. Fragments and excerpts will give a fair sense of the whole:

Little spider
spiding sadly
in the webly
light of leaves!

...

Where, on the notched horizon,
So endlessly a-drip,
I saw all of a sudden
No sign of any ship.

...

Lean sidewys on the wind, and if it bears
Your weight, you are a daughter of the Dawn -
If not, pick up your carcase, dry your tears,
Brush down your dress - for that sweet elfin horn
You thought you heard was from no fairyland -

...

When Uncle Jake
Became a Snake
He never found it out;
And so as no one mentions it
One sees him still about.

...

I cannot give the reasons,
I only sing the tunes:
the sadness of the seasons
the madness of the moons.

This last one, the first stanza of five, seems to me the perfect expression of what and why poetry is. And it makes a case for the purest poetry being well-constructed nonsense verse. Peake's art - visual and literary - contains sadness, madness, a song-like beauty, and a wide love of the universe. So too his life.

[Stuart · Rating 3 out of 5]

'Half magical, half tragical'

'Magnetic form; your coldness'

'My Queen of fire and dread,
Divine amalgamation
Of swedes and copper-thread'

[Leila Anani · Rating 3 out of 5]

I first came across Mervyn Peake through his nonsense poetry which fascinated and delighted me as a child - it was only much later that I discovered the genius of Gormenghast. This new volume collects together my favourite poems: "O Here it is! And There it is!" and "The trouble with geraniums" all beautifully illustrated by Peake with a whole host of other poems which I'd never read - Particularly like "Tintinnabulum" and "The Hideous Root"

The poems clearly show Peake's love of the English language and his perception of words as shapes and sounds. However, the majority of them are nonsensical even by nonsense poetry standards - At least Lear and Caroll make some kind of delirious sense and have a coherence within themselves - much of the poetry here makes no sense at all and is "quite obscure and practically marzipan" - When they are coherent they are works of genius, but sadly some are to my mind at least, pure gibberish. Perhaps I'm now too old for nonsense verse who knows... but I found this anthology a very mixed bag of quality.

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a load of nonsense! Great nonsense actually. This slim volume brought a smile to my face, most of the time, especially Mervyn Peake's first poem for his wife Maeve, 'The Dwarf Of Battersea'. Other highlights were 'Aunts and Uncles', 'The Men In Bowler Hats Are Sweet' and the unfinished 'The Adventures Of Footfruit'. Some great drawings accompany the text, and in this edition 12 previously unpublished ones.

[Graychin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Peake’s nonsense verse is a lot of fun and his illustrations are wonderful, but this collection is pitifully meager and most of it can be found in Peake’s Progress.

[Astir · Rating 2 out of 5]

An exceedingly poor man's Edward Lear.

[Susannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

just lovely

[Sydney More · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun to read aloud. The illustrations were a nice surprise for me.

[Reena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun, fantastic and bizarre nonsense!

[Ribatul Islam · Rating 5 out of 5]

The trouble with geraniums
is that they’re much too red!
The trouble with my toast is that
it’s far too full of bread.

The trouble with a diamond
is that it’s much too bright.
The same applies to fish and stars
and the electric light.

The troubles with the stars I see
lies in the way they fly.
The trouble with myself is all
self-centred in the eye.

The trouble with my looking-glass
is that it shows me, me;
there’s trouble in all sorts of things
where it should never be.

this one will be my all time favourite.

[Annie]

Just adding stuff