The Sopping Thursday

by Edward Gorey

An umbrella is missing. A man is distressed. A thief scampers over rooftops. A child is in danger. A harangued salesclerk weeps. A dog save the day. The intriguing story of The Sopping Thursday is unlike any other Edward Gorey book, both because of its unique gray-and-black illustrations and because it has a happy ending (if one is to dismiss any worry about the child featured in the last frame). In just thirty images and thirty short lines of text, Gorey manages to create a complex tableau of characters and a plot worthy of film noir. Long out of print, this new edition is faithful to the size of Gorey's original drawings and wisely refrains from offering any editorial commentary...except to say this Gorey jewel is--to quote the eminent literary critic Edmund Wilson--"a brilliant discovery."

Genres: Fiction, Picture Books, Art, Graphic Novels, Humor, Comics, Childrens

64 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

Born in Chicago, Gorey came from a colourful family; his parents, Helen Dunham Garvey and Edward Lee Gorey, divorced in 1936 when he was 11, then remarried in 1952 when he was 27. One of his step-mothers was Corinna Mura, a cabaret singer who had a brief role in the classic film Casablanca. His father was briefly a journalist. Gorey's maternal great-grandmother, Helen St. John Garvey, was a popular 19th century greeting card writer/artist, from whom he claimed to have inherited his talents. He attended a variety of local grade schools and then the Francis W. Parker School. He spent 1944–1946 in the Army at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah, and then attended Harvard University from 1946 to 1950, where he studied French and roomed with future poet Frank O'Hara.

Although he would frequently state that his formal art training was "negligible", Gorey studied art for one semester at The School of The Art Institute of Chicago in 1943, eventually becoming a professional illustrator. From 1953 to 1960, he lived in New York City and worked for the Art Department of Doubleday Anchor, illustrating book covers and in some cases adding illustrations to the text. He has illustrated works as diverse as Dracula by Bram Stoker, The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells, and Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats by T. S. Eliot. In later years he illustrated many children's books by John Bellairs, as well as books in several series begun by Bellairs and continued by other authors after his death.

Reviews

[karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

this book reads like a dare or a challenge: can you, edward gorey, write and illustrate a book in which a man loses an umbrella, another man tries to buy an umbrella but is dissatisfied with his options, various people discuss the likelihood of rain in the coming days, etc. and still make people wanna read it?



edward gorey rises to the challenge! it's not my favorite of his books, but considering it's not a narrative so much as "some things that are happening on a rainy day from a variety of perspectives," it's amazing that it is even a teensy bit entertaining. and it's way more than that. who doesn't love a very good dog??



these two pictures sum me up pretty well; i love rain, i hate umbrellas.





why do i hate umbrellas?? because danger.





this "review" is really just a response to how very sad i am that i endured that whole "summer" nonsense, and now we are supposed to be getting five days in a row of driving rain and i could be in my little home sitting by my window drinking barry's tea and reading - but nooooooo - THIS is the weekend i will be out of town and missing it all. nature abhors a karen.

come to my blog!

[Calista · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this story wins the award for saying ‘Umbrella’ the most times in one short little story. Each line pretty much contains the word umbrella.

It’s a very rainy day and the master of the house can’t find his umbrella and goes searching all over the house for it. The dog also goes looking for it because he is confident that he can find it. There is a poor lady in an umbrella shop that a man just can’t find the right umbrella. Everyone is being soaked. The dog finds the umbrella with a baby in it. It is the master’s umbrella. The end is a little dark, but I did get a chuckle from it.

This is more like a New Yorker kind of humor and I didn’t read this to the nephew. He might have liked it, who knows.

I enjoy the contrast of the back dog against the white master. His color use of black and white ink is very clever. All the umbrellas are black too. I find it a great little story.

Edward was so clever.

[Drew Canole · Rating 4 out of 5]

It starts raining and people are having all sorts of problems with umbrellas. Trying to find the perfect one, trying to get one to open, having one misplaced and stolen! It’s pretty good fun but not creepy enough to be a Gorey classic for me.

[Jessie Drew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gorey's drawings never disappoint! . Understanding that this is a funny matter of chances amongst a group of people during a rainy day, you shouldn't expect a coherent storyline. Just some light hearted fun. :)

[Nina · Rating 5 out of 5]

(read on a thursday) I love edward gorey!!!!!!

[Catherine Elliott · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great "starter" Edward Gorey book. Even people who are not Edward Gorey fans will like this book. A must-have for anyone who is a fan of black labs.

[Sam Quixote · Rating 1 out of 5]

A city. It starts to rain. Some people stand in the rain with umbrellas. Some don't. A dog talks, a baby wanders away from its mother (and is found without harm pages later), and someone is trying to buy an umbrella. Mundane talk about rain.

That about sums up this book. It's format is one page of illustration, the opposite page has a single sentence. It can be "read" in a minute maybe and the drawings are unmistakably Gorey's but aren't particularly interesting or show his ability.

I don't understand the book - it feels like a Monty Python sketch but one of the lesser ones, long forgotten. I'm amazed this got republished as it's just so... nothing! There isn't anything here. If you're interested in the brilliant Edward Gorey I suggest trying elsewhere like books such as "The Doubtful Guest" or "Amphigorey".

[Paula · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you have any umbrella phobias like I do, this might, or might not, be a calming solution!

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Follows a typical course for an Edward Gorey story, the heroine of an inconsequential matter is not a human. In fact, often the animals, monsters and fictional creatures act better and with more sense than the humans do.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

A big Gorey fan, I found this book to be one of my favorites. The awesome gray-scale drawings and the incredible Gorey text make this one a keeper! Of course, Bruno the dog saves the day! This quirky little story puts a Gorey smile on my face!

[Benja · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Sopping Thursday is basically a series of jokes about umbrellas malfunctioning or being misplaced in the midst of a raging downpour. It's sparsely written, visually very funny and probably has the closest thing you'll ever get to a happy ending in a Gorey book.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bruno, What a noble beast.

[Shane Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you fancy dogs, you may fancy this book.

[Peacegal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, but not as good as his older stuff.

[Erika · Rating 5 out of 5]

Edward Gorey+Dog = Love it!!

[Jessica Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not as macabre as some of his other works but each page is its own story.

[ke-sha · Rating 3 out of 5]

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite entertaining, nice little book to have while waiting in line.

[Susan Walker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Long before graphic novels became popular, Edward Gorey was publishing his enigmatic, meticulously illustrated short works. The words uttered in thought balloons in Sopping Thursday are not as powerful for narrative purposes as the drawings. The characters are dressed in Edwardian clothes and appear to occupy a well-to-do residence of that era. The storyline is disjointed but starts with a man in a long, double-breasted overcoat searching for his umbrella. At his feet lies a pure black dog of a larger breed; the dog bears the dark undercurrent of the tale. As the story progresses, a baby is rescued from a floating umbrella, someone is poked in the eye with an umbrella and another character is swallowed up by a collapsing umbrella. If there is a moral to this story, it may be in the old superstition about never opening an umbrella indoors.

[Reading For Sanity · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this review and others at https://readingforsanity.blogspot.com...

[Kaethe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, I call it humor. If Chekov told the exact same story it would be tragedy, or melancholy, or such. It's comedy from the dog's point of view anyway.

Personal copy

[Canavan · Rating 3 out of 5]

✭✭✭

[Emmy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Honestly, I didn't really get it.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes! This one was fantastic! I’m still chuckling. And what fantastic artwork!

[Ramesh Abhiraman · Rating 5 out of 5]

First edition. My second copy (the first has a soiled cover)

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

A refreshing read on a very hot day.

[Radwa · Rating 4 out of 5]

a very good dog goes to extreme lengths to find his owner's ubmrella in this rain-infested umbrella-apocalypse world

[Rick Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rereading Edward Gorey 2023. In The Sopping Thursday, EG manages to work outside of his usual subjects and milieu, producing an environment still suffused with his wit and nonsense sensibilities.

Favorite quote:
None of these umbrellas will do.