"Elegant Enigmas" catalogs the contents of a traveling Gorey exhibit from a few years ago. The book is heavy on original art reproduction and slim on any new biographical content (slim, that is, if you have read "Ascending Peculiarity").
With the name Pomegranate affixed as publisher, you know you will be presented with high quality printing, and an overall well-made book. Image selections from Gorey's well-known works (such as Doubtful Guest, Hapless Child, Willowdale Handcar, Gilded Bat, Deranged Cousins, etc.) look BETTER in this book (with thick semi-gloss paper) than in the Amphigorey collections (standard thinner paper). There's also a number of color images, including rare designs for a 1983 Mikado production. Reproductions of envelopes Gorey sent to his mother, drawn while he was attending Harvard. And the most interesting inclusion of all: drafts for book ideas. Draft of a Blue Aspic image. Alternate covers for Fatal Lozenge and Object-Lesson.
Buy it for the art and the behind-the-scenes drafts.
If you are looking for a lot of biography material, you're probably better off with "Ascending Pecularity". (NOTE: Pomegranate's "Floating Worlds: The Letters of Edward Gorey and Peter F. Neumeyer" is also an excellent, excellent work. If you read the Letters book, you'll feel like you had a chance to visit with the man himself.)
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