Last month schools across America celebrated Dr. Seuss' 101 birthday. Seuss, a master of rhyme, rhythm, imagination and storytelling, did many great things for children's books. He also left a terrible legacy -the Verse Curse!
The Verse Curse occurs most often when wannabe children's book writers wrap a strong message in a "nice little" story and sugar-coat it with verse. The only ones who can publish books like these are celebrities who get away with rhymes that slant so much they fall down, words chosen for rhyme instead of reason and stories where sense is sacrificed to pseudo poetry. In a way these are page turners. Readers want to get to the end ASAP and discover why the author has been published.
An example? A Walk in the Rain with a Brain (HarperCollins, $16.95) has a curious beginning as Lucy discovers "What I thought was just rain/ Was, of all things, a brain!/ It looked like a lump of cold smoke./ But then it surprised me/-and spoke!" This makes little imaginative or sound sense until you realize it's written by Edward Hallowell, co-author of the well-known adult book on ADD, Driven to Distraction.
Real rhythm and rhyme experts know how to excite and entertain a child with a blend of satisfying story and perfect meter. New children's book writers could learn a lot from studying recent releases by four authors who have mastered the medium.
Lisa Wheeler's Farmer Dale's Red Pickup Truck (HBJ, $16.00, ages 3-6) begins when Farmer Dale, a generous dog, makes room in his beat-up truck for Bossy Cow, Woolly Sheep, Roly Pig, and Nanny Goat. Predictably, the overcrowded truck fails and the animals get feisty until they work together to push the vehicle to town. The genius of this simple story lies in the author's gift for patterns, talent for word play, and knowledge of how to meld both of these with tale. Each character is introduced in a way that reveals personality peculiarities, animal traits and sets up increasingly complicated group dynamics. After each introduction follows a bouncy refrain that begins: "The truck bounced up. The truck bounced down. It spit and sputtered toward the town." Throughout, the refrain changes to reflect the growing strain on the truck and stresses of the lively animals. There are natural conflicts and consequences, humor, animal sounds, bright drawings by Ivan Bates, and a bit of a surprise at the end. Energetic rhythms speed the story along with efficiency Farmer Dale's truck would envy.
It's hard to duplicate a successful story with a sequel - harder still if you're using rhyme and rhythm. Julia Donaldson and illustrator Axel Scheffler follow The Gruffalo (newly released in board book from Penguin, $6.99) with The Gruffalo's Child (Dial, $16.99, ages 3-7). In the first book, a clever little mouse outwits predators by dreaming up the monstrous Gruffalo. When a real Gruffalo appears, the fast-thinking hero gets the better of him, too. All this with a blend of suspense, rhymes, refrains, humor, and surprises.
In the sequel, the brave Gruffalo's daughter decides she'll take on the mouse. Her father warns that his "eyes are like pools of terrible fire, and his terrible whiskers are tougher than wire." Both books have similar patterns, characters, tricky plot twists, and repeatable choruses that make for perfect transitions and great reading aloud. And yet there are enough differences that each tale is pleasing and stands alone. "Aha! Oho! A trail in the snow!" the Gruffalo's child exclaims at each track she discovers. Every animal she encounters builds her fear of the "Big Bad Mouse". She discovers he's only a small rodent who will "at least/ "taste good as a midnight feast". But wait there's one more surprise. Who wins this battle? The audience who will love this book as much as the first!
Another successful repeat performance comes from writer Bill Grossman and illustrator, Kevin Hawkes. In My Little Sister Ate One Hare (Dragonfly, $6.99; ages 4-7), a small girl gobbles a number of strange animals as her brother counts them and wonders what takes her so long to "throw up then and there". In the alphabet-based companion, My Little Sister Hugged An Ape (Knopf, $16.95; ages 4-7) she's up to her eccentric antics, hugging her way through an alphabetic cast of animals with the same kind of silly, mildly revolting results that audiences savored in the first book
This one starts with a crowd pleaser. "My little sister hugged an APE/ And squeezed its tummy out of shape,/ Till it let out a burp with a horrible sound/ That knocked my poor sister right on the ground." The book continues with a fanciful string of events, occasionally interrupted with a summary couplet ("ABCDEFG. "My sister's on a hugging spree"). Her hugs tangle her in the knots of an octopus, wipe the stripes off a zebra, and finally end with a special hug for...her brother!
Judy Sierra and illustrator Marc Brown dedicate their Wild About Books (Knopf, $16.95, ages 3-8) to Dr. Seuss. This book was received the 2005 EB White Read Aloud Award. The story starts when Bookmobile Librarian Molly McGrew drives her bus into the zoo, and "By reading aloud from the good Dr. Seuss,/ She quickly attracted a mink and a moose." Animals of all species start stampeding "to learn all about this new something called reading". This book clearly reflects Sierra's passion and knowledge about rhyming, books, reading, young children and humor! The perfectly scanned lines and bright illustrations are filled with delightful book references. While younger fans appreciate allusions to The Cat in the Hat, older readers will find hidden humor in the misspelled line: "llamas read dramas while eating their llunches". In this perfect read aloud, Sierra honors animal behaviors, kind treatment of books, and Dr. Seuss.
Wheeler and Donaldson,
Grossman, Sierra...
good poets like these
are much better and rarer
than those who write
nothing but horrible verse.
Bad poetry's awful,
bad poets are worse.
(Rhyme by Luli Gray, scansion expert and children's book author)
More Magnificent Rhymed Stories
Free verse is in vogue in children's books. This style has appeared in fiction and non-fiction, for children of all ages, and two verse works were nominated as finalists for National Book Awards. Many children live for humerous poetry books and few find else. Uniting verse and story will widen the appeal and effect of poetry on children.
This poetic phenomena may be linked to the wild success of author Karen Hesse's 1999 Newbery-winner, Out of the Dust. Her newest novel in verse,Witness (Scholastic, $16.95; ages 10 and up) , is less successful than her first. Hesse uses eleven voices to relate the story of 1924 KKK prejudice in a small Vermont town. While the plot flows well from one exquisite poem to the next and the situation is gripping, Hesse's eloquent expression gets in her own way. The depth and strength of each character and poem is like a chorus of beautiful singers who defy harmony.
Dissonance is exactly the point Hesse is making, but readers may be pulled out of the story to question the characters. Six-year-old Esther Hirsh has a voice that seems mature and babyish at the same time. While these contrasting qualities make for remarkable poems, readers may wonder about her authenticity. This might be a book better used for reader's theater, for when I listened to the novel read by a full cast (Listening Library, unabridged, 2 tapes, $18.00) , Esther's voice was accented and her ethnicity made senes of the strange strange speech. This tape also includes an illuminating author interview.
Newbery-winning author Sharon Creech uses verse in Love That Dog (HarperCollins, $14.95; ages 9-12) . Jack, the narrator of the book, is at first, unwilling and skeptical about poetry . His first journal entry reports, "I don't want to / because boys / don't write poetry ./ Girls do." He's a bit more open in his second journal entry, "I tried./Can't do it./Brain's empty". In a believable sequence of poetic entries, he evolves in appreciation of poets like William Carlos Williams and Robert Frost and his imitations of their work give glimpses into his tender heart and reticence to reveal his hurt. By the story's end he has been captured by the power of poetry as he writes of a beloved dog, inspired by the work of Walter Dean Myers.
The author's form is crucial to this book's success. Her character's words are simple, but have a young poetic quality which explains why his teacher, Miss Stretchberry reaches out to him. Jack's gradual acceptance of poetry mirrors the trust of his own emotions; and the inspiration of poetry guides his creativity and courage to risk. In under 100 pages of short verses, the author captures the caring of a sensitive teacher, exposes children to some wonderful poems and tracks Jack's journey into artistry with the very form that speaks to him.
Sports-appeal might be the first thing that draws children into Maria Testa's Becoming Joe Dimaggio (Candlewick Press, $13.99; ages 9 and up). Another might be brevity. This fifty-one page novella, apparently simple in form and style, has a complexity it may take an adult to fully appreciate. Joltin' Joe is the book's central image, but it is really the story of young Joseph Paul and his grandfather,Papa-Angelo, who's nurtured him from birth. Joseph Paul is born at start of the carreer of the Yankee's of a new center fielder "whose name sounded like music". Dimaggio becomes a hero and a bond for the grandfather and grandson and "Papa-Angelo had dreams / to go with his nightmares."
This, the last line of the first poem, typifiesTesta's artistic gift; she buries an painful line in the warmth of the tender images, haunting readers with contrast and symbolizing the young boy's complex life; his grandfather's warmth and their shared baseball passion provide the stability and balance he needs for his family struggles because of his despicable father. We learn of Joseph Paul's Papa when he remarks, "'You'll never forget this Christmas!' "just before his fist/ crashed/ into someone's face". And as Joe Dimaggio puts on a different uniform to help his country during WWII, the boy's father walks down "Busy streets / with his head held high, / faking a limp / for the war effort." Contrast describes WWII and the first summer Joe DiMaggio doesn't play baseball when roaring crowds are compared to the blast of V-J Day and Joseph Paul can't imagine "anyone cheering/ in Hiroshima."
In just over twenty short poems, Testa animates a young boy's admiration for two heroes who support him from birth to college. As a young boy, Joseph Paul dreams of being a baseball great. As a pre-med student, he stands with his grandfather on a college campus, "knowing who we are,/ who we have become./ Look how we have made / our broken hearts soar."
Virginia Euwer Wolff's True Believer (Atheneum, $17.00; ages 11 and up), is the second book in a trilogy and the winner of this year's Young Adult National Book Award. Part of the decision to write the novel in verse may have been continuity, as Wolff's first book Making Lemonade (Atheneum, ) was written in this style. The poetic form fits her heroine, LaVaughn, well. LaVaughn, a wistful, pensive sort, has much to puzzle out now that she's fifteen and facing adolescent worries. The book's free verse reflects the language patterns of the African-American culture that has nurtured LaVaughn, and Wolff's powerful poetry balances the hard truths LaVaughn must face in an environment where "... the pavement around here is filthy from side to side,/ the alleys reek / and they are full of deadly events that could happen any minute."
LaVaughn hits adolescence hard. Her friends have deserted her for the "Cross Your Legs for Jesus" club, she struggles in accelerated classes, she falls in love for the first time with disastrous results and keeps a secret that shames her. Concerns about sexuality and feelings of hopelessness threaten her college "life plan" and her mama cautions, "You need a long memory, LaVaughn. / You can't go forgetting the minute it gets too hard."
There are many adults in her corner. Her biology teacher warns " 'Backsliding is dangerous, LaVaughn,/backsliding is like quicksand. You know?'" At her sixteenth birthday party, LaVaughn is faced with irrefutable evidence that she is so loved that she accepts change, amd sees her own strength and resilience.
Marilyn Nelson unites poetry and biography in Carver, a life in poems (Front Street, $; ages 12 and up) , a Newbery-honor book. These are not simple verses, but intricate expressions of Carver's enigmatic and complex personality.
Carver was driven by a desire to know and he paid for his education by becoming "a wizard with a washboard,/a genie of elbow grease and suds...the best washerwoman in town". The author writes of his reaction to lynchings and injustice, his relationship with Booker T. Washington and the success that came of his curiosity and an ambition to do right by his people. How fitting that poetry is used to convey the way Carver married art and science to reach other human beings. These fifty-nine vignettes give glimpses that leave us wondering and seeking more information, a perfect representation of a man who did the same.