Text 52

SLOW SLOTH'S

SLOW SONG

I ….. am……a……sloth

A…… sloth……am……I.

I…… live……in……trees.

But……I……can’t……fly.

I…… do……not……run

I……am……so……slow.

But …… I……am……where.

I……want……to……go.

Another fascinating children's poet is Eve Merriam. She is keen on wordplay. Yet her Inner City Moter Goose (1969) is a very 'grown-up' book: the poet exploits well-known nursery rhymes to reflect on the harsh realities of inner city life in the turbulent 1960s. The book is an open and straightforward response to the attempts aimed at wiping out the Black liberation movement by the authorities committed to taking up the White Man's burden. One of the editions shows the role of illustrations in intensifying the message of the book.

Illustrations do play an important role in children's books industry today. There are scores of them published in the world daily. These are books which deal with various aspects of our existence. Lots of burdens are there for the humanity to take up, irrespective of the color of the skin. One of the problems facing everyone is the preservation of nature. Children's authors do not distance themselves from it. No doubt, they can make a worthy contribution to the conservation efforts creating the new mentality from an early age.

One such author is Lynne Cherry, an award-winning author and book illustrator. She has illustrated a lot, and written more than a dozen books herself. All her books beautifully depict the natural world and eloquently teach children to experience and appreciate nature. Her art shows how a modest and unassuming rhyme can turn into a marvelous picture-book.

Indisputably, the poet writing for children is not likely to become an extinct species in our lifetime. The same about the translator who translates the poet who writes for children who care to read...

4.7 Children's poetry in Russian

Russian poetry for children has a long tradition, too. It developed about the same lines, from dull didactic and moralistic tales in rhyme to something more advanced. The most curious thing is that many of the poems we tend to consider very old are not such. The famous lines, There in the wood a little fur-tree was born, are just one hundred years old, no more. The same about many other classical children's verses.

Many outstanding Russian poets who made themselves a reputation writing serious stuff also wrote for children, sometimes very finely indeed.

In Soviet times children's poetry was originally like Cinderella among her ugly propaganda-clad sisters. Even Chukovsky's imaginative verses received their share of destructive criticism. One can only wonder how Chukovsky managed to survive the Stalinist terror being the author of a poem about a scary cockroach who terrorized everyone with his evil-looking moustache!

Chukovsky and Marshak managed to survive, but many of the younger poets did not. For instance, in Leningrad, Nikolai Oleinikov, Alexander Vvedensky, and Daniil Kharms – all of them talented authors – perished.

Daniil Kharms (1905—1942) was probably the most lear ical of the three. It is curious to learn that in his 20s he was an avid reader of nonsensical poetry written by Carroll and Lear, mentioning the English authors among his best favorite writers (Text 53).