Gollub (Uncle Snake, 1996, etc.) translates 33 of Issa's more than 20,000 haiku, intersperses them through a short biography, and caps it all with an explanation of some of the poems' less obvious images. With the Japanese originals running decoratively along their margins, Stone's appealing formal paintings illustrate the poems literally: children in traditional dress stand with their mouths up and open as "Mouth-watering snowflakes fall/lightly, lightly,/heaven's snack," and green melons in a basket do "turn to frogs!/If people come near." Gollub explains that the haiku are not presented chronologically, so any connections between them and specific incidents in Issa's troubled life are speculative. Nevertheless, readers will get a glimpse of the poet's extraordinary range of subject and feeling, as well as cogent instruction in how to read and understand these deceptively simple verses. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1998
ISBN: 1-880000-71-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Lee & Low Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1998
Sabuda’s interpretation of Mother Goose is a work of moving art, which necessitates that it also be treated like one. This isn’t a volume that will survive the wear and tear of many circulations; some of the paper parts have to be gently coaxed into position. However, the reward for handling with care is great; these feats of paper engineering not only illustrate nursery rhymes in three dimensions, but they also reinterpret them, e.g., “One, two,/Buckle my shoe” is reenvisioned as a woodpecker and a hen preparing for a night out. “Knock on the door” shows the earnest woodpecker tapping on the front entrance with his beak, while “Pick up sticks” shows the hen choosing her lipstick. Glorious colors and elaborate configurations of blackbirds bursting out of pies and peacocks fanning their feathers make this an exhibition of paper prowess that’s unforgettable. (Pop-up. 4-9)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-689-81192-6
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1999
PLB 0-7868-2406-9 Bryan, Carole Byard, Brian Pinkney, Jerry Pinkney, Jan Spivey Gilchrist, and Faith Ringgold pay tribute to Dunbar, a poet who heard the rhythms in everyday life and recorded them, e.g., “Jump back, honey, jump back” is what waiters called out to one another before coming out the swinging door of the kitchen into the dining room of a restaurant. Here, that phrase is part of “A Negro Love Song,” which Jerry Pinkney envisions as a young man and young woman at a garden gate. “Little Brown Baby” is a poem written for his father; “Dawn,” captures the quiet mystery of a new day: “An angel, robed in spotless white,/Bent down and kissed the sleeping Night./Night woke to blush; the sprite was gone./Men saw the blush and called it Dawn.” Readers will enjoy these poems and the variety of illustrative styles, but the words are even more meaningful if they are recited aloud. (Poetry. 5-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-7868-0464-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Disney-Jump at the Sun
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1999
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