Review - Garbage Delight

Garbage Delight
by Dennis Lee
illustrated by Frank Newfeld
Date: 1977
Publisher: HarperCollins
Reading level: C
Book type: illustrated poetry collection
Pages: 64
Format: e-book
Source: library

Peppered with regional names, sing-song rhythms and a dash of wicked fun, Garbage Delight has been a staple on Canadian bookshelves for thirty-five years. Its forty-two superbly crafted poems offer a feast of silly, sassy and soothing verses for every taste, from the thundering “I Eat Kids Yum Yum!” to the more lyrical “The Coming of Teddy Bears.”

This handsome classic edition featuring Frank Newfeld’s original illustrations and book design will have a new generation of readers banging their spoons for more.

(synopsis from Goodreads)

Ugh! Nope.

I thought some of the poems in The Ice Cream Store were pretty bad. Outdated. Inappropriate. But this... This is even worse.

Garbage Delight is as old as I am... and that makes me feel positively ancient. Many of the poems in here are just plain nonsense. Others are kind of offensive (like the one about the girls with facial hair where one of them blows her face off with a bomb). Some are downright horrifying; one poem has a child throwing his little brother from the CN Tower. When that inexplicably doesn't kill him, he stuffs him in the furnace and waits eagerly for December when the heat will go on.

Both of these poetry collections are too old. There are only a few poems that could work for today's audiences. They should maybe be collected and put into a new volume with nicer pictures. (I'm not a fan of the illustrations here. They're outdated--again, that seems to be a theme--and not particularly appealing to look at. I liked the pictures in The Ice Cream Store much better.)

I can't recommend this. If you want a cringe-worthy look at what was deemed appropriate literature for kids in 1977, have a look... but I wouldn't recommend letting a child read it.

Selection: 2/5
Meter: 2/5
Illustrations: 1/5
Originality: 2/5
Enjoyment: 1/5

Overall: 1.6 out of 5

Review - The Ice Cream Store

The Ice Cream Store
by Dennis Lee
illustrated by David McPhail
Date: 1991
Publisher: HarperCollins
Reading level: C
Book type: illustrated poetry collection
Pages: 64
Format: e-book
Source: library

Young readers will fall in love all over again with Dennis Lee’s light-hearted verse, which embraces universal childhood experiences of every flavour, from digging holes to foreign lands to searching for the perfect pet. David McPhail’s gorgeous watercolour paintings capture Lee’s subtle celebration of multiculturalism and offer a colourful feast for the eye.

(synopsis from Goodreads)

Meh. Not great.

I think there was maybe one poem I liked in here. The rest were either too boring, too repetitive, or too outdated. Microaggressions abound. The age of this book may be causing many of its problems; such a thing would probably not be published today.

Aside from the problematic content (like the very first poem that compares children of different races to ice cream flavours), many of the poems are just weak. A few attempts at rhyme fall flat. "Canary" doesn't rhyme with "Kalahari", for example. Nor does "Maine" rhyme with "Spokane". As a result, some of the rhymes seem forced. The meter isn't all that consistent, either. You think you're reading something like a limerick, and right in the middle it'll change. I don't like that.

I read Alligator Pie a few years ago, and I think I probably enjoyed that one more. This one is just so full of cringe-worthy moments equating certain nationalities with negative traits that I can't really recommend it to today's audience.

Selection: 2/5
Meter: 2/5
Illustrations: 3/5
Originality: 2/5
Enjoyment: 1/5

Overall: 2 out of 5

Review - The Cat and the Wizard

The Cat and the Wizard
by Dennis Lee
illustrated by Gillian Johnson
Date: 2001
Publisher: Key Porter Books
Reading level: C
Book type: picture book
Pages: 32
Format: e-book
Source: library

This picture book tells the story of a disgruntled wizard and his unwanted bag of tricks. One day, in a laundromat, he befriends a black cat with a spiffy hat, a heart full of hospitality, and no one to share it with. Together they retire to Casa Loma, where the party begins.

(synopsis from Goodreads)

The Cat and the Wizard is cute rhyming story about a wizard who has skills nobody wants and a would-be hostess of a cat who lives in a castle all by herself.  I didn't realize that Casa Loma is a real castle in Toronto... but it is, and that makes reading a story about it all the more interesting.

The whole book is written in rhyming verse, and for the most part, it flows off the tongue quite well.  The wizard has skills of questionable usefulness, but they're awfully fun to read about.  The cat wears a spiffy hat, and seems to be something of a Martha Stewart wannabe.

I have few quibbles with the text itself.  However, I was really disappointed by the illustrations.  I have a hard time believing they were done by an "acclaimed illustrator".  They seemed rough and amateurish to me.  It's a shame, because with really cute illustrations, this could have been a book that I would wholeheartedly recommend.  As it is now, it would be a good book to read aloud to children... but the disappointing illustrations would probably prevent it from being a picture book that kids would want to look at again and again.

Quotable moment:

He carries a bird's nest

That came from the Ark;

He knows how to tickle

A fish in the dark;

He can count up by tens

To a million and three--

But he can't find a home

For his wizardry.

Recommended to: parents who intend on reading the amusing verse aloud to their kids

Premise: 4/5
Meter: 3/5
Writing: 4/5
Illustrations: 2/5
Originality: 4/5

Enjoyment: 3/5

Overall: 3.29 out of 5

Review - Alligator Pie

Alligator Pie
by Dennis Lee
illustrated by Frank Newfeld
Date: 1974
Publisher: Macmillan Company of Canada Ltd.
Reading level: C
Book type: picture book
Pages: 64
Format: e-book
Source: library

Dennis Lee won the Governor General's Award for poetry in 1972 for his poetic meditation on Canadian identity in Civil Elegies, but he made perhaps his most enduring contribution to Canadian nationalism two years later with a short collection of near-nonsense rhymes written for a much younger set. Alligator Pie, which remains the classic Canadian bedtime book, is written as if Mother Goose had the Latin name Branta canadensis, from William Lyon Mackenzie King, who "loved his mother like anything," to Trois-Rivières, which, of course, rhymes with "eat your hair."

(synopsis from Goodreads)

I've known about Alligator Pie for years.  I was introduced to the title poem when I was in elementary school.  Its bouncy rhythm is unforgettable.  I'm not sure if I read the book as a child or not, because none of the poems seemed familiar (with the exception of "Skyscraper", which I'm pretty sure was read to us in Grade 1).

Given that this book is almost 40 years old, it's not surprising that aspects of it feel a bit dated.  Some of the illustrations are obviously from another time.  A poem about measles and mumps shouts that it's from another era.  And perhaps spousal abuse was once considered humourous, but that's no longer the case.

However, that being said, there are still a number of highly enjoyable poems in this collection.  "Alligator Pie" is one of the best.  "Ookpik" made me giggle.  "On Tuesdays I Polish My Uncle" has some delicious rhymes involving a pet shark.  "The Friends" is a sweet little poem about a child and their friend named Egg.  "Tricking" is a cute poem about reverse psychology.  "The Sitter and the Butter and the Better Batter Fritter" is so much fun to read aloud... if you can do it without cracking up at your attempts at the tongue twisters within.

This book is also extremely Canadian.  Poems like "In Kamloops", "Bed Song", "William Lyon Mackenzie King", "Tongue Twister", and "Kahshe or Chicoutimi" all feature distinctly Canadian people or places.  There's even a poem about hockey, appropriately titled "The Hockey Game".

The meter of these poems is such that they have a tendency to get stuck in your head, like a jump-rope song.  Some of them reminded me of the poems in A. A. Milne's When We Were Very Young and Now We Are Six.  I did not realize that Dennis Lee had been a lyricist for Fraggle Rock.  The whimsy and fun he brought to those songs is on full display here.

If you can overlook the few dated poems and illustrations, you'll probably find quite a bit to like here.  It would be a fun book to read aloud to children... but it's also fun for adults who just want to indulge their inner child.

Selection: 3/5
Meter: 4/5
Illustrations: 3/5
Originality: 4/5
Enjoyment: 3/5

Overall: 3.4 out of 5