Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices

by Paul Fleischman | Poetry |
ISBN: 9780060218522 Global Overview for this book
Registered by wingGoryDetailswing of Nashua, New Hampshire USA on 2/4/2022
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1 journaler for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by wingGoryDetailswing from Nashua, New Hampshire USA on Friday, February 4, 2022
I got this hardcover from Better World Books. It's the winner of the 1989 Newbery Award.

This is a really marvelous collection of poems about different types of insects, formatted for two voices, such that some of the lines are read individually and some are read together. In most cases the lines that both people read are the same, but in others the text varies, turning the poem into a kind of a round. I wish this had been around when I was in school - it would have been a lot of fun to stage a reading!

The artwork by Canadian artist Eric Beddows really enhances the book - including the marvelous stylized stick-insects-reading-books on the endpapers.

The poems include water-striders trying to explain to other insects how they walk on water, although:

"But by that time our student      But by that time our student
no matter how prudent
has usually                                       has usually
                                                            don't ask me why
sunk from view.                               sunk from view."

The poem on fireflies describes them as "insect calligraphers practicing penmanship" of "vanishing messages, fleeting graffiti". And "Book Lice" introduces two critters who fell in love while having very different (and literal) tastes in literature: "And there we've resided and there we'll remain, he nearby his Shakespeare, I near my Spillane".

The "Honeybees" poem also has two points of view - one from a worker bee and one from the queen - with the worker finding that being a bee is a pain, while to the queen it's a joy.

And there's an entry on praying mantises that goes for literal prayers - the mantises chant requiems to a long list of different prey species, "grant them rest eternal"...

An unusual, lovely, and intriguing book!

Released 1 yr ago (7/6/2022 UTC) at -- somewhere in Sterling MA (see notes) in Sterling, Massachusetts USA

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

I left this book on the lamb statue dedicated to the author of "Mary Had A Little Lamb". Hope the finder enjoys the book!

[See other recent releases in MA here.]

*** Released for the 2022 Canada challenge. ***

** Released for the 52 Towns in 52 Weeks challenge. **

** Released for the Newbery Medal challenge. **

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