Great introduction to poetry for kids. The little poems are funny in their absurdity but also at times give food for thought, intentionally or not. Cool illustrations from over 150 years ago from the author. Overall a super enjoyable book to read with kids.

This children's book is composed of 4 originally-released as individual separate books:

(1) A Book of Nonsense (1846) - composed of several funny 4-line 1-stanza poems accompanying hilarious pictures

(2) Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany and Alphabets (1871) - composed of longer poems, several short outrageously funny stories, pictures of out-of-this-world plants and alphabets whose individual letters are accompanied with silly meanings.

(3) More Nonsense Pictures, Rhymes, Botany, etc. (1872) - basically the same as #2

(4) Laughable Lyrics: A Fresh Book of Nonsense Poems, Songs, Botany, etc. (1877) - more of poems and they are supposed to be sung but I don't recognize any of them.

The following are my favorites:

Nonsense Rhyme:

n  There was an Old Man who said, "Well!
Will nobody answer this bell?
I have pulled day and night, till my hair has grown white,
But nobody answers this bell!"n

Nonsense Song:"The Owl and the Pussycat" for their love affair and the lines: "O lovely Pussy, O Pussy, my love, / What a beautiful Pussy you are, / You are, / You are! / What a beautiful Pussy you are!" There is also the poem (song) entitled "The Daddy Long-Legs and the Fly" and it struck me because I know there is a children's book about Daddy Long-Legs. So, that one came from this work by Edward Lear?

Nonsense Story: "The History of the Seven Families of the Lake Pipple-Popple" is my favorite because it is easier to read and has more funny pictures. "The Story of the Four Little Children Who Went Around the World" is also nice and it felt related to what Edward Lear dreamed when he was still alive: go around the world. Even if this is a children's book, you can still see how the poems and stories are actually based on the author's thoughts, experiences and even dreams.

John Ruskin, author of The King of the Golden River, also a very recent read, has this to say about this book: "Surely the most beneficent and innocent of all books yet produced is the "Book of Nonsense," with its corollary carols, inimitable and refreshing, and perfect in rhythm. I really don't know any author to whom I am half so grateful for my idle self as Edward Lear. I shall put him first of my hundred authors." Coming from an author who wrote a nice novel about wind toppling the vicious brothers and some kind of powerful hermit-king turning the river into gold, adds credibility to this book. This is a nice funny book especially if you have nothing to do and you just want to enjoy simple poems with rhymes that you normally see posted on the kindergarten room's walls.

Edward Lear (1812-1888) was an English artist, illustrator, author and poet, and is renowned primarily for his literary nonsense, in poetry and prose and especially his limericks, a form that he popularised. So, there is really a genre or sub-genre for literary nonsense. Cool, I have at least one book friends who always talks nonsense but he is funny. We don't always want to be serious, right? Besides, it is easier and more enjoyable and more beneficial to health if we laugh more in between serious matters.

What is also noteworthy here is the genius of Edward Lear as an illustrator. Brilliant. Even if the figures were more than a century old, they still look fresh as if they were conceptualized by Lear only yesterday.

Love the Nonsense Songs, some of which have a strange, melancholic charm, and are far superior to the limericks, most of which leave me cold.

[italiano in fondo (con una mia traduzione-reinvenzione)]

What we have here? «Innocent Mirth» - as the author said? Oh no...

We have Fun!
and Despair!
and Descriptions of the Human Condition!
and Lessons in Good Taste!
And Val d'Aosta Cows!



Fun:

There was an Old Man of Moldavia
Who had the most curious behaviour;
For while he was able
He slept on a table,
That funny Old Man of Moldavia.


Despair:

There was an Old Man of Cape Horn,
who wished he had never been born:
so he sat on a chair
till he died of despair
that dolorous Man of Cape Horn.


Existentialism:

There was an Old Man who said, “Well!
Will nobody answer this bell?
I have pulled day and night,
Till my hair has grown white,
But nobody answers this bell!



Refined Models of Living:

There was a Young Lady of Corsica,
Who purchased a little brown Saucy-cur;
Which she fed upon Ham
And hot Raspberry Jam,
That expensive Young Lady of Corsica.


Mucche della Val d'Aosta:

There was an Old Man of Aosta,
Who possessed a large cow, but he lost her;
but they said: “Don’t you see
She has rushed up a tree?
You invidious Old Man of Aosta!”


...And much more




(volevo continuare a leggere bevendo senza sosta una bevanda dal gusto effervescente:

ma costava un puttanaio
quel chinotto dal lattaio!)

l'annunciata traduzione-reinvenzione:

Una giovane donna di Corsica
comperò un cagnetto che morsica:
lo nutriva a prosciutto,
marmellata con strutto.
Spendacciona, la donna di Corsica!