POEMS OF ROBERT BURNS

Whether or not today's youth can personally relate to an elegy for ""The Author's Only Pet Yowe"" (ewe) or to ""An Address to a Haggis"" (pudding of entrails) is difficult to ascertain. The poems of Robert Burns are the products of a vastly different society, yet if approached in the spirit of fun, are likely to please. Frankenberg, in his brief and lively introduction, ""Scotch, Scottish and Scots,"" turns a few clever semantic somersaults explaining his title and goes on to stress the importance of accepting Burns as an excellent writer of ""light verse""; the fine illustrations of Joseph Low are in harmony and do much to enhance the effect of the whole. The poems are divided into four sections: ""Aye Rowth O'Rhymes"" which includes many well known brief poems, a few spicy lesser known works and the complete ""Epistle to James Smith"" and ""The Holy Friar""; ""Tam O'Shanter""; ""The Jolly Beggars""; and, finally, ""Gin a Body Kiss a Body,"" a lovely, standard sampling of Burns' songs. In order to preserve the flavor of the poems, Frankenberg has happily presented them in their native Scotch dialect and has included a glossary at the end of the book. If, however, he had included the translations of difficult words at the bottoms of the pages with the poems themselves, the young reader would find Burns far less tedious and far more tempting.