First Poems - Softcover

Julia Eccleshare was born and educated in Cambridge. Her accomplished career includes editing for the Times Literary Supplement, Puffin Books and Hamish Hamilton. Julia currently works for The Guardian.For Orchard books Julia has edited the story collection How the Camel got His Hump and the poetry collection First Poems. (September 2000)Julia is married with four children and lives in London.

Grade 3-5-This tempting sampler of light verse offers 60 poems, most of which are by English or American authors. Included are old favorites such as Stevenson's "The Land of Nod," Carroll's "Beautiful Soup," Lear's ubiquitous "Owl and the Pussycat"; a handful of Mother Goose rhymes; and works by contemporary writers such as Judith Viorst, Max Fatchen, and Spike Milligan. Selections are loosely grouped together by topic-friendship, sibling rivalry, nonsense, animals, nature, etc.- with a nice mix of short works (four lines or less) and medium-length verse (generally four or five stanzas). Most of them rhyme, but there are a few samples of blank verse as well. There are a couple of weak entries, but most are of excellent quality. The brightly colored black-line and watercolor cartoons that appear on every page are highly appealing. Oddly, though, the multiethnic children all look alike-round-faced and chinless. The title of the collection may present a slight problem, as the abstract concepts in many of the poems are too sophisticated for the very young. While not an essential purchase, the volume will make a pleasant addition.
Karey Wehner, San Francisco Public Library
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.