Falling Up

July 1, 1996
Gr 3 Up-Fifteen years after A Light in the Attic (1981) and 22 years after Where the Sidewalk Ends (1974, both HarperCollins), Silverstein, whose poetry has achieved cultlike popularity, offers readers another collection. While bodily functions seem to be the source of humor in more poems than in the earlier titles, and while there are fewer wonderful images here, the child appeal is as strong as ever. Once again, Silverstein's pen-and-ink drawings are the perfect accompaniment to the poems, always extending and often explaining the words. The book abounds in energetic wordplay ("I saw an ol' gnome/Take a gknock at a gnat/Who was gnibbling the gnose of his gnu") and childlike silliness ("I only ate one drumstick/At the picnic dance this summer...But everybody's mad at me, /Especially the drummer"). Silverstein writes wonderful nonsense verse, but he has used rhyme and rhythm to greater effect in the past. There is much to love in Falling Up, but it has its ups and downs.-Kathleen Whalin, Greenwich Country Day School, CT

Starred review from May 27, 1996
All the things that children loved about A Light in the Attic and Where the Sidewalk Ends can be found in abundance in this eclectic volume, Silverstein's first book of poetry in 20 years. By turns cheeky and clever and often darkly subversive, the poems are vintage Silverstein, presented in a black-and-white format that duplicates his earlier books. Like Roald Dahl, Silverstein's cartoons and poems are humorously seditious, often giving voice to a child's desire to be empowered or to retaliate for perceived injustice: one child character wields a "Remote-a-Dad" that will instantly control his father, and another dreams of his teachers becoming his students so that when they talk or laugh in class, he can "pinch 'em 'til they ." The poems focus on the unexpected-a piglet receives a "people-back ride" and Medusa's snake-hair argues about whether to be coifed in cornrows or bangs. Sometimes the art traffics in gross-out, as when William Tell gets an arrow through his forehead or a cartoon character sticks carrots in his sockets because he's heard that carrots are good for his eyes. Although some parents and teachers may cringe at such touches, Silverstein's anti-establishment humor percolates as he lampoons conventions (the stork not only brings babies but "comes and gets the older folks/ When it's their time to go"), or discards decorum (a small gardener zips up his pants after watering the plants "that way"). No matter that the author's rhythms and rhymes can be sloppy, or that his annoying insistence on leavin' off the endin' to his ING's seems artificially folksy, Silverstein's ability to see the world from, as he says, "a different angle" will undoubtedly earn this book a wide audience. All ages.

Starred review from July 1, 1996
%% This is a multi-book review. SEE the title "The Heart" for next imprint and review text. %%Gr. 3^-6, younger for reading aloud. It's been a long wait for fans of "A Light in the Attic" (1981), but it was worth it. This new collection includes more than 150 poems, ranging from the story of Pinocchio ("that little wooden bloke-io" ) in 11 verses to the poignant, two-line "Stone Airplane": "I made an airplane out of stone . . . / I always did like staying home." As always, Silverstein has a direct line to what kids like, and he gives them poems celebrating the gross, the scary, the absurd, and the comical. The drawings are much more than decoration. They often extend a poem's meaning and, in many cases, add some great comedy. "Imagining," for example, which begins, "You're only just imagining / A mouse is in your hair," is accompanied by a picture showing a little girl with an elephant on her head. Wordplay abounds, as in the poem "The Gnome, the Gnat, and the Gnu" ("That gnat ain't done gnothing to you" ), and the meter only falters a few times. Silverstein also cleverly plays with the design of the book, occasionally continuing a drawing onto the next spread. His final picture actually disappears into the central ditch of the book, with a warning not to pursue, "cause if you try finding / some more in the binding, you may just . . . disappear." And in addition to all the laughs, he slips in some thought-provoking verses about animal rights, morality, and the strange ways humans behave. Expect high demand, and stock up. ((Reviewed July 1996))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1996, American Library Association.)