WHAT IS POETRY? The Essential Guide to Reading and Writing Poems written by past UK Poet Laureate Michael Rosen, illustrated by Jill Calder and just published in the US in 2019 is an engaging introduction to poetry. The writing is focused and conversational and includes discussions about how poems put forth ideas, create impressions, play with words, can be symbolic, speak very personally or with borrowed voices, tell a long story or just seize a moment.
Most chapters are anchored with poetry from such English poets as Emily Dickenson, Robert Browning, Christina Rossetti, Robert Louis Stevenson, Lewis Carroll, and Shakespeare. Personification is discussed by studying Tennyson’s The Eagle. Christina Rossetti’s Who Has Seen the Wind? represents poetry’s ability to capture a felt moment.
Rosen also includes some of his own poems from such books as A Great Big Cuddle and Bananas in My Ears to highlight the concepts of hyperbole, wordplay, imagery, and symbolism.
The more complicated aspects of poetry from rhythm, rhyme scheme, and metaphor to simile, allusion, and free verse are also put forth in a clear and concise manner. One of the most useful characteristics of this book, however, is Rosen’s discussion about how to begin to write a poem. He suggests getting an idea from a dream, a conversation, a picture, a story or from a celebration of culture by writing about food, traditions, customs, and festivals.
What is Poetry? The Essential Guide to Reading and Writing Poems by Michael Rosen is an attractive way to assist children ages 9-12 with getting involved in the wonderful world of poetry (Candlewick Press, 2019).
Questions for What is Poetry? The Essential Guide to Reading and Writing Poetry
Personification, giving human characteristics to things, animals, feelings, and thoughts, is often used in poetry as Rosen suggests. Relook at Tennyson’s The Eagle on page 21. Select an inanimate object from your closet such as a shoe. Create a shoe character. Give her/him a human name and a personality with likes and dislikes and habits and duties. Then write a short description of this shoe character in free verse----no regular rhythm or rhyme. Play with your imagination!
Alliteration, the repetition of the first letter of certain words, is very appealing to the ear. Go on the web and find a copy of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven. Read the first 12 stanzas aloud so you can hear the well-placed alliterations. Mark them. You will be surprised by how many there are! How do these alliterations move the story and the soundscape along?
Which poem in this book is your favorite? Why? How does it make you feel? Which poem in this book is new to you? Are you glad to be introduced to it? Why? What poem would you like to see included in this book? Why?
