The Space Child's Mother Goose

Compulsive reviewer chromatic takes a break this time from the ultra-serious by reviewing a kids' book to help fill the need for reading material aimed at kids which don't treat them as idiots. It also sounds like good reading for post-kids, in the same way that Dr. Seuss is. The Space Child's Mother Goose author Frederick Winsor pages 100 publisher Purple House Press rating 9 reviewer chromatic ISBN 1-930-900-07-4 summary Rhymes and verse for budding (or budded) cosmologists and scientists.

The Scoop

In the mid-fifties, a poetry and science fiction fan teamed up with a pen illustrator to produce The Space Child's Mother Goose. Decades later, enough people still remember this book fondly that existing copies sold for up to $150 apiece. Purple House Press, a small Texas publisher, continues to reprint influential books from that era. Their reprint of this classic doggerel (in the best sense of the word) will appeal to children of the 50s through the 00s.

What's to Like?

This is a clever, fun book. Instead of making up alien names, or substituting "robot" for characters in traditional nursery rhymes, the scientific concepts are integral to the poems themselves. Consider this excerpt:

Three jolly sailors from Blaydon-on-Tyne
They went to sea in a bottle by Klein.
Since the sea was entirely inside the hull
The scenery seen was exceedingly dull.

Fortunately, the glossary in the back has (brief) explanations of some of the weightier terms. Combined with a good encyclopedia, there's nothing here an inquisitive eight-year-old couldn't decipher.

Winsor pays tribute to the classics, postulating how the king's men could have saved Humpty Dumpty with a time machine, or waxing eloquent about the theory Jack built. There's a general air of... excitement, maybe, surrounding the book. (Something else reminds me of Kit Williams' Masquerade riddle, though I can't put my finger on it.)

The illustrations nicely complement the text. The simple, anthropomorphic birdmen seem oddly familiar, like undamned Bosch characters. They're appropriately Spartan, though with plenty of important details. The gestalt evokes the feel of an old Tom Swift novel. Maybe it's the matter of fact, "let's fly to the moonbase in our rocket car" post-Sputnik optimism.

This is a fine book for children, and adults with child-like spirits. It might stir a latent interest in astronomy or mathematics. Even if it doesn't, the new and interesting words and witty rhymes are worth memorizing. This book's been due a reprint for several years.

Be sure to catch the recurring poem about a chronologically gifted black hen. It's reprinted in French, German, Greek, Swahili, and Chinese, with pictures to match.

What's to Consider

Some kids might not like the book -- it takes a certain kind of mindset to absorb new concepts normally reserved for middle-school geometry class. It's hard to resist trying it out, though. Find an elementary school-aged friend or relative and spend an hour working through the riddles.

The Summary

Hemos recommended this book as "cute." It is. It's not cute in a saccharine way. It's almost as if the author were reciting his poems to a straight-laced Nobel committee -- before turning backstage to give the rest of us a great big wink. He's hoodwinked the establishment.

You can purchase this book at Fatbrain.

Comments

other non-idiot child books

[Kevinv]

I love Daniel Pinkwater's books. Great non-idiot children books (probably for kids a bit older than this book is intended for -- junior high or a bit earlier).

Mr. Tompkins

[Amazing Quantum Man]

As a kid, I enjoyed George Gamow's "Mr. Tompkins in Wonderland". I recently introduced my 11 year old daughter to Mr. Tompkins. (So yes, to whoever it was, /.'ers *DO* have kids!).

It's a great introduction to modern physics.