"Anon. is not my favorite poet," writes K. Amis, butting against the first Oxford Book of Light Verse (1938) compiled by W. H. Auden, which includes anonymous ballads, folk songs, and nursery rhymes right along with the poems of Chaucer-to-Byron-to-Betjeman. Auden took light verse to be popular verse—"simple, clear, and gay," the natural voice of the people, and not always humorous or cheerful. Amis, who will have none of this socialist-tinged nonsense ("I will be satisfied if another generation. . . sees in mine a reactionary anthology"), has compiled a collection of poetry which is light by contrast with high and serious verse, "subversive, disrespectful," technically impeccable ("a juggler is not allowed to drop a plate"), and, in its developed form, a product of modern times. Here, the output from Shakespeare and Jonson to Swift, Southey, Byron, and Hood occupies only 80 pages (which, for reasons given, allot no space to Dryden, Pope, or Burns). Then we are treated to a large sampling of vers de societe from Praed ("Good night to the Season!—the dances,/The fillings of hot little rooms") to—surprise—Thomas Hardy to Betjeman, Auden, and Philip Larkin who, even at their most frivolous, transcend the form. There is a plenitude of parody (a glut, one suspects, for some tastes), a so-so assortment of nonsense verse (big on Gilbert, weak on the too-"whimsical" Lear), some lovely oddments (like the anon. clerihew: "Spinoza/ Collected curiosa:/ Bawdy belles-lettres,/ Etc"), and, as he notes, a large representation of the poets of Amis' generation, some of them rather too archly British to elicit anything but a sneer over here. (The small, unrepresentative American selection—B. Franklin, Bret Harte, Frost, De Vries—is best forgotten, as the title suggests.) So: a strongly flavored selection, sparkling and accomplished and sedulously unserious, to supplement (but not supplant) Auden's more lingering measures.
Pub Date: June 1, 1978
ISBN: 0192820753
Page Count: 347
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1978
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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