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The Space Child's Mother Goose
from the what-down-mother-goose dept.
| 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:
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.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.
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.
other non-idiot child books (Score:2, Informative)
Hey this is cool (Score:1)
It is one of the great things about the internet: nobody knows you're a dog :-)
More seriously though, one of the problems with children's books is that children develop their reading skills at different times. So we need easy books but on subjects 15-16 year olds will find interesting, likewise we need books for 5-8 year olds which do not treat them like morons, but which have material suitable for their age.
I remember reading Beowulf when I was 9 years old, and I thought it was pretty cool, but it was slightly above my age range.
On the subject of "kid's entertainment"... (Score:1)
Another childrens book reviewed? (Score:1)
I know you have a lot of teenagers on the site, but that doesn't mean you actually have to cater to them. Encourage them to stretch themselves a little. It can't hurt.
Also in the same vein (Score:1)
Quoted in MTW (Score:2, Interesting)
Children's books (Score:2)
The idea of a children's book devoted to science and technology is deliscious. But then you can have all sorts of childrens books that can subtlely influence the mind of a child.
For example how about a child's story about a man who wanted to own all of the windows in the world?
"I do not care if I am a louse,
You cannot have a window in your house
Not round, or short, or fat, or square,
You cannot have a window, not anywhere"
;)
I loved that book (Score:1)
She lays eggs in the relitive when,
She doesn't lay eggs in the positive now,
Because she's unable to postulate how."
I still remember that rhyme from when I first read the book in the early 70's during my larval stage programming. Thanks for posting a link. Now I will finally get a copy
Great News! (Score:1)
I loved this book when I was growing up. I have no idea where my parents got a copy- it must have been well out of print by the time I read it- but it's wonderfully funny book. It's great to read that it's back in print; I think I'll pick up a copy to give to my niece.
At last, at last, at last (Score:1)
At last, a copy of my own - and the kids are sophisticated enough mathematically to get it all. Maybe I'll get three, one for me and one for each of them.
Pricing (Score:2)
My wife told the dealer she didn't care about condition, and got a dog-eared paperback copy for something like $30 or $50.
OTOH, the slashdot effect could drive prices considerably higher.
Excellent! (Score:1)
When I was about six or seven, I used to love reading Richard Scarry books [amazon.co.uk], especially the ones about how things work. I loved taking things to bits and putting them back together -- or at least trying to! I always hope that when I have children, they'll be interested in those kinds of things too, so I can build them the cool robots I just learned about in class today! ;-)
Just wondering, in the experience of the parents (or researchers) among us, to what extent are children's interests affected by the interests of their parents?
Mr. Tompkins (Score:4, Informative)
It's a great introduction to modern physics.
Expensive books OOP (Score:1)
It's really a crime to let books out of print sell for over $100. Publishers should react to this and re-edit the volumes but to my great despair, not much is done from their part.
I came to look for some great books that I wanted to buy again and was so sad to see their prices being so high and therefore unaffordable to me. I contacted the publisher at the time and the response I got were that it was not a big market enough for them to do the reprint. Even when I mentioned that these books had a regular waiting line of 10 people on half.com with a minimum price tag of $400-$600 (or about 500x what the book was selling at the time.)
Unfortunately, with them having the publishing rights, there is not much one can do to solve this problem.
PPA
Oh happy days! (Score:1)
Most influential book of my childhood (Score:2)
The book is definitely aimed at children and not adults, but the concepts are interesting and cool enough that it's interesting geek reading too. I still occasionally find myself reciting erudite-yet-silly bits from it, and my original copy is one of my most treasured posessions.
The book is full of translations of "My Black Hen" into a zillion languages -- they're enough to make any kid think about philosophy:
Probably, Possible, my black hen.
She lays eggs in the relative when.
She doesn't lay eggs in the positive now,
Because she's unable to postulate how!
There's no guarantee that SCMG will make your kid an astrophysicist -- but it'll sure help...
Another book I recommend (Score:2)
It's out of print but your local library may still have a copy, or you can track it down from a used bookseller.
Fine Stuff! (Score:1)
I too encounterd that book in my youth .. and found it again here in the local library. So don't complain about high internet prices before checking out the free options!
I'm hoping to animate it some time - and make up a few more poems myself. I could even put out an edition of THE SIGNS OF MOTHER GOOSE: Semiotic Rhymes for Children...or some book where all the poetry is in M68K assembler,FORTH or JCL or whatever.
[bottles of beer on the wall, anyone?]
Fans of this book can pop over to Jef Poskanzer's home page to hear ALL off the Singing Science records (not just Space Songs, whence TMBG copped "Why Does The Sun Shine?".) visit: http://www.acme.com/jef/science_songs/ [acme.com]. GLory to Tom Glazer, Dottie Collins, Marias and Miranda [maraisandmiranda.com] educating you with folk songs of Space, Weather, Nature and More Nature, Experiments and Energy & Motion!
The other books I read a lot in this vein as a child were the two anthologies "Mathematical Magpie" and "Fantasia Mathematica", books of short stories, poems, cartoons,jokes and songs with a Mathematical theme, edited by Clifton Fadiman.
You may have read a lot of these before, but there they are all in one place. (Nine Billion Names Of God, The Feeling Of Power,--And he built a Crooked House, The No-Sided Professor .. )
Rudy Rucker edited a similar (mostly inferior and a little redundant) collection called The Mathenauts much later.
Another neat children's book (Score:1)
Scifi for kids (Score:1)
wow. I haven't seem comentary on slashdot like thi (Score:1)
Oh well...
Old news (Score:1)
ago and it was rejected, so there.
Next time listen to me.
Re:It's good for geek kids (Score:1)
Depends on the child, of course, and on the parenting said child has had. Yes, your average kid-off-the-street wouldn't handle it well, but I've met a few proto-geeks (with parents who've shielded them from pirated Britney Spears, or better yet simply exposed them to better stuff) who would no doubt handle it well.
I'm quite certain that proto-geekdom is more than 50% a matter of really good parenting. As for how exactly one goes about such really good parenting, I don't know yet... but then, 'twill be a few more years (at least!) before I need to worry about that anyhow.
my kids are worth the $ for a book (Score:1)
I print out manuals and such all the time, and that's fine. But for a literary work, I'd rather have a book. Especially a kids book, which usually has good artwork.
and frankly, I'd rather my kids get the impression that I think they're worth the money for a real book. My kids, at 6 & 4, already have more books than I had when I left home for college, and I'll keep buying them books as long as they keep reading them...