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Significant Edward Lear Poems Discovered

"The Owl and The Pussycat" poem by  Victorian nonsense poet Edward Lear || Photo: Collected

"The Owl and The Pussycat" poem by Victorian nonsense poet Edward Lear || Photo: Collected

Previously unseen poems and letters written by Victorian nonsense poet Edward Lear have been found hidden in a private collection.

The discovery was made by University of Nottingham PhD student Amy Wilcockson in the British Library.

While sifting through manuscripts, Wilcockson noticed some pages written by Lear to a young English woman he had befriended in Italy, reports BBC.

The university said the finds were significant.

Wilcockson found the pages, which contain a limerick about an old man on a bicycle, a poem and several letters, in a large collection of manuscripts known as the Charnwood Autograph Collection.

They were written by the poet - best known as the author of The Owl and The Pussycat - to Mary Mundella, the daughter of a Nottingham hosiery merchant.

Mary passed the correspondence down to her niece, Lady Dorothea Charnwood.

Wilcockson said: "I was flicking through when I came across a poem, 'The Last of the Octopods'.

"I read the poem and laughed out loud; it was humorous and nonsensical.

"Imagine my joy when I read the signature of the poem's author."

After some research, it became clear the pages were unpublished and unseen by the public, and Wilcockson said she realized she had "something special" on her hands.

"I think this is a really major find for 19th-century literary studies, and it deserves a wider public audience too," she added.

The discoveries have now been digitized by the British Library.

Amy's co-researcher Dr Edmund Downey said: "I've felt very privileged helping bring these works to light. The texts will make a significant contribution to Lear scholarship."

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