Oh dear, so what?
To be sure, Gorey could be cartoonish. The bell jar world of his cozy-sinister stories, set in the England of the Victorian, Edwardian, and Bright Young Things eras and populated by vamps, shifty-eyed vicars, doubtful guests, deranged opera fans, and, famously, little dears whose absurd deaths are played for laughs (The Gashlycrumb Tinies), threatens at times to tip into goth kitsch. Gorey’s style and sensibility are so instantly recognizable, yet so uncategorizable, that, like David Lynch, he’s earned his own adjective: Goreyesque. The trouble with becoming an adjective, of course, is that it flattens you out, reduces you to a checklist of stylistic tics and well-worn themes that can quickly become the straitjacket of cliché—or, worse yet, self-parody. ©
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