Honorary Fellow’s Address 2002: The owl and the pussycat: where are we going to?

The owl and the pussycat went to sea in a beautiful pea-green boat’ and after a ‘year and a day’ they reached ‘the land where the bong-tree
grows.’ That much we all know but how many know that Edward Lear had started a sequel about the children from this union, two verses of
which were published posthumously?

Our mother was the Pussy-cat,
Our father was the Owl,
And so we’re partly little beasts
And partly little fowl,

The brothers of our family
have feathers and they hoot,
While all the sisters dress in fur
And have long tails to boot.

R. Nicholson, CBE, RIBA, HonFIStructE
Director, Edward Cullinan Architects, London