The Gashlycrumb Tinies

The Gashlycrumb Tinies: or, After the Outing is an abecedarian book written by Edward Gorey that was first published in 1963. Gorey tells the tale of 26 children (each representing a letter of the alphabet) and their untimely deaths in rhyming dactylic couplets, accompanied by the author's distinctive black-and-white illustrations. It is one of Edward Gorey's best-known books,[1] and is the most notorious amongst his roughly half-dozen mock alphabets.[2] It has been described as a "sarcastic rebellion against a view of childhood that is sunny, idyllic, and instructive".[2] The morbid humor of the book comes in part from the mundane ways in which children die, such as falling down the stairs or choking on a peach. Far from illustrating the dramatic and fantastical childhood nightmares, these scenarios instead poke fun at the banal paranoias that come as a part of parenting.[3]

The Gashlycrumb Tinies (1963)

The first related work to the Gashlycrumb Tinies by a different author details the mis-adventures the children experience that leads them to their final demise, as depicted in Gorey's illustrations.[4]