Review by New York Times Review
IF babies get an edge in math by listening to Mozart, might poetry - Mother Goose, Shakespeare's sonnets, Emily Dickinson -tune young ears to the music of language? Here are four collections - two anthologies, two by individual poets - to take children from their earliest delight in sounds to mature enjoyment of such demanding poetry as Ted Hughes's. Like the nursery rhymes of Mother Goose, the verse in Jane Yolen and Andrew Fusek Peters's "Here's a Little Poem" is blessed with catchy rhythms. The 61 selections reflect the toddler's expanding world: sections include "Me, Myself and I," "Who Lives in My House?" and "I Go Outside." Good humor reigns, as in Margaret Mahy's strategy with a "remarkably light" sister ("It's a troublesome thing,/but we tie her with string, / and we use her instead of a kite") and Michael Flanders and Donald Swann's "Mud," with its exuberant illustration of gleeful splashing. The pacing is nicely varied: "Mud" follows Langston Hughes's mellow "April Rain Song" ("Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops"). Bedtime poems round out a collection with just one misstep: Milne's "Halfway Down" breaks off halfway, at "the stair / where / I always / stop," robbed of its raison d'être - the intriguing notion that "It isn't really anywhere! / It's somewhere else / instead." Still, with a wonderful range of choices and Polly Dunbar's inviting illustrations, this could become a favorite lap book. Children will meet some of the best-known poetry in English in Jackie Morris's "The Barefoot Book of Classic Poems." Some are so well known as to seem superfluous ("The Road Not Taken," or Shakespeare's Sonnet 18: "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"), yet it's worth remembering that children themselves are new. The bright watercolors and intriguing hints of story that Morris splashes across the pages make this an attractive venue for first encounters with the soon-to-be-familiar. Though Morris revels in the romantic ("She Walks in Beauty"), her art serves other moods as well - the "jocund company" of Wordsworth's "Daffodils," Siegfried Sassoon's bitter memories of war. Even without the lush format, the more than 70 poems have enough range and allure to entice the young and the adults who read to them. Luminaries like Yeats and Poe keep amiable company with Ogden Nash ("The Tale of Custard the Dragon") and Alfred Noyes ("The Highwayman"). While anthologies open young minds to poetry's unbounded possibilities, books like the new collections by Valerie Worth (1933-94) and Ted Hughes (1930-98) impart a deeper sense of a single poet. Worth wrote several volumes of "small" verses. Her poems typically segue from the ordinary (raw carrots, say, or weeds; an old clock; a dead crab) to a small, precise epiphany - about what's described, about the reader, about the world. Natalie Babbitt, Worth's frequent collaborator, excelled in delicate pencil drawings that were perfectly paired with the poet's gentle insights. Surprisingly, Steve Jenkins's bold cut-paper collages suit these funny, thought-provoking (and previously unpublished) "Animal Poems" just as well. Don't tell the children (let them enjoy the poems on their own terms), but Worth also teaches what poems can do. Sounds can reverberate ("Snail": "Only compare/our ... rugs and chairs, / to the bare / stone spiral / of his one / unlighted / stairwell") and mimic movement (minnows' "slivers / sift together / in a scintillating / mesh"); the poet adroitly compares (camels "munching and belching / like smug old maids / remembering") or challenges perceptions ("The bear's fur/is gentle but ... we/look, and his / hot eye / stings out / from the dark hive / of his head / like a fierce / furious / bee"). She can build from innocent awe at a gorilla's latent power to an unexpected payoff: "Strong / enough to / fear no / enemy; / feeding / serenely / on celery." Meanwhile, in brilliantly composed collages, Jenkins (whose "What Do You Do With a Tail Like This?" was a Caldecott Honor Book in 2004) catches the essence of each creature - a shaggy groundhog poised on an ample white background, a whale afloat in deepest blue - with expertly snipped paper, textured or marbled, feathery or sleek, deftly adding such details as eyes of luminous intelligence. Worth's voice is quizzical, yet wise and affectionate. Ted Hughes's "Collected Poems for Children," many of them also about animals, are as perceptive and as well informed on nature's minutiae. He too telegraphs profound significance with exquisite skill. But Hughes inhabits a far darker world, fraught with sharp teeth, claws, knives and strange visions: a pig's nightmare of the sun as a fried egg; a needle to stitch poets' eyelids "so they can sing better"; a "Moon-Lily" fading away in "nights of quiet sobbing, and no sleep for you." The word "children" in the title of this omnibus (it incorporates eight earlier books) is unfortunate. Older kids will enjoy the first 60 pages, especially the oddball characters in "Meet My Folks!" But even here it's often the deceptively cheery rhymes and rhythms, more than the subject matter, that suggest a young audience. In the first poem a seal's eyes are "as wild / and wide and dark / as a famine child" that has "lost its mother." And while some poems are laced with humor and virtuosic wordplay, Hughes tends to upend the most innocent context with abruptly savage imagery. On the other hand, teenagers will easily relate to such darkly allusive, fantastical works as his "Moon Poems" ("In every moonmirror lurks a danger. / Look in it - and there glances out some stranger"). Absorbed in the newly discovered depths of their own souls, they're ripe to appreciate disillusionment, as well as Hughes's phenomenal craft. Adults, however, may be the best audience for the cruel beauty of the poems that make up "Season Songs," with their expert depiction of rural life and resonant imagery. Raymond Briggs's drawings are splendid: they develop the fantastical, underline fierce horror or add a touch of pathos. His sensitivity, rough humor and grasp of humanity's dark side match the poet's perfectly - another reason this book is a keeper, one to rediscover in all life's seasons. Joanna Rudge Long, a former editor at Kirkus Reviews, writes and lectures about children's books.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 27, 2009]
Review by Booklist Review
Vivid imagery and an expert command of sound and meter distinguish this collection of poems about animals. Each spread is dedicated to a different creature, from tiny snail to blue whale, and Worth's inventive metaphors will startle readers into thinking about common animals in new ways: A wasp is a sharp flake of / Night let loose / In daylight, for example, and jellyfish are transparent / Ghost-bells / Of lost lands. Jenkins' masterful, spare cut-paper collages illustrate each selection, and the picture-book format seems a bit at odds with Worth's more challenging, philosophical poems, which demand an older child's expanded vocabulary and knowledge of science concepts, such as evolution. There are many poems that will be accessible to younger children, though, and the poetry's many strengths overcome any questions about the intended audience that the format raises; even teens may appreciate Worth's well-honed poetry and her intelligent, creative views of the animal world. Suggest this with Diane Ackerman's Animal Sense (2002). --Gillian Engberg Copyright 2007 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
This pairing of the late Worth's exquisite poems with Jenkins's (What Do You Do with a Tail Like This?) extraordinary, cut-paper illustrations make this a volume to treasure. Characteristic of the best of Worth's work, each poem in this handsome volume is a gem-full of crisp language, vivid images and thoughtful ideas. A keen observer, Worth captures not only the look of each animal she describes, but grounds her remarks with wise perceptions about the world both animals and humans inhabit. Camels "stand/ About munching and belching/ Like smug old maids/ Remembering their ancient/ Sway, when bearded/ Traders sailed them over/ The starry sand-waves." Jenkins's illustration portrays the subject as sloe-eyed and stately. His artwork, as textured as oil paintings, contains astonishing shadow and depth. Serrated paper edges resemble a squirrel's warming fur as "late autumn rains/ Fall colder than snow." The transparent tentacles of a jellyfish appear to undulate, "their hollow/ Veils and/ Trailed clappers/ Peal eternal/ Knells, for/ Valleys drowned/ And flooded hills." Jenkins features each animal silhouetted against a solid background (often cream or undersea blue), so that poem and illustration do not compete for attention but, rather, they work together to startle readers with their exactitude. Describing a spider's web, Worth comments, "The spider weaves it,/ .../ But at dawn, when/ It hangs spangled/ With silver water, frail/ .../ it is not/ Her web, but ours." This stunning collection will encourage readers to become careful observers, and to make the world of nature their own. Ages 4-up. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 3-8-This posthumously published collection of 23 poems is masterfully illustrated with colorful cut-paper collages. Worth's artistry lies in painting nuanced word pictures in a few spare lines of free verse. Her poems are often exquisite, always thoughtful, and apt to leave readers with an entirely new perspective. In "Bear," she focuses on the creature's cagy fierceness: "The bear's fur/Is gentle but/His eye is not:/It burns our/Way, while/He walks right/And left, back/And forth, before/Us-." "Jellyfish" crafts an aura of elegant mystery: "Rising under water/Like transparent/Ghost-bells/Of lost lands-." Presented on beautifully designed spreads, the offerings are animated by Jenkins's exquisite artwork. Whether eye-catching or subtly understated, his designs respectfully bear out each poem's image. The author's indelible description of a porcupine "Held fast/In the thicket/Of its own/Thorns" is marvelously brought to life in the brilliant, multidimensional-looking illustration of a small creature peering shyly from its spiky tangle. In "Star-Nosed Moles," readers are first drawn to the visual depiction of another unassuming animal, paws splayed at an awkward angle, but this image only underscores the delicious irony of the poem's artful metaphor, which likens moles to miners with "velvet-coated/Appetites, their taste/For treasure fed/On all the buried/Wealth of earth." Worth's work deserves a wide audience: this superlative collaboration will resonate with poetry lovers, but should also open doors for those who feel daunted by poetry.-Marilyn Taniguchi, Beverly Hills Public Library, CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
(Primary, Intermediate) Although young readers are likely to know all twenty-three animals showcased in this posthumous collection of newly published poems, they will greet each animal freshly through the inventiveness of Worth's free verse. The words she chooses do not, in themselves, astonish; rather, it is her remarkable ability to use common language uncommonly, and musically, rich with sound sameness and repetition. She startles us with the truth of her particular observation. The snail's dwelling, contrasted to our own multi-roomed and variously furnished homes, becomes ""the bare / Stone spiral / Of his one / Unlighted / Stairwell."" Kangaroos, alone among animal babies, can go home again, ""Return[ing] headfirst / To the delectable / Pocket of the dark."" The lighter-than-air hummingbird ""Sprang straight / From the sun,"" while the weighty whale, incapable of living on land, finds ""His whole hill of / Flesh floats easily / In the sea."" Master cut-paper artist Jenkins matches Worth's verbal surprises with his own visual revelations. To each animal he gives texture and dimension, whether it is the ordinary wren, the lowly cockroach, or the more imposing elephant or gorilla. Without background clutter, each double-page spread devotes itself to a single poem and image, impressive and regal in their cumulative effect. Copryight 2007 of The Horn Book, Inc. All rights reserved. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
