AWAY AND AGO: Rhymes of the Never Was and Always Is

by David McCord ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 23, 1975

Like Ogden Nash, who is among the galaxy of prominent McCord admirers quoted on the jacket, the author of these and other Never Was and Always Is rhymes is an accomplished practitioner of deliberately bad verse -- forced rhyme and awkward caesura and enjambment in particular. Of course McCord does more playing around with sound than Nash did, often to the detriment of significance though he can be counted on never to sacrifice meticulous grammar. Proper usage and the oddities of language and letters are in fact the subjects of a few of the poems, which are playful in a way that might appeal to a certain donnish, earnest kind of kid. Otherwise the subjects are the traditional ones of children's verse -- balloons, Christmas stockings, Little League, Halloween, even the contents of a boy's pockets. Taken one at a time they might be amusing but the technical games wear rapidly.

Pub Date: Jan. 23, 1975

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 84

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1975

Categories: NONFICTION