Let's use the title as a way to gain an insight into this book.
This is home - the themes in this book (as identified by Jackie French) include Colony, The Stolen Land, A Hard Land, Heroes and Legends, A Nation Forged in Drought and Hardship, Anzacs, Immigrants, Learning this Land, Laughter and Beyond our Beaches.
Essential - Jackie says:
"If even a few poems in this book make you feel as if a window has been washed, and you see the world more clearly and more beautifully, then that's enough."
Australian - contributors to this book include famous names, poets from the past and names all young readers will recognise and ALL are Australian. Here are a few:
Contemporary names - Andy Griffiths, Phil Cummings, Steven Herrick, Shaun Tan, Alison Lester and Danny Katz
From our Australian past - Dorothea Mackellar, Oodgeroo Noonuccal, AB Banjo Patterson, Henry Lawson and CJ Dennis.
And there are familiar and very famous poems too such as:
The Triantiwontigongolope
My Country (abridged)
Andy's gone with the Cattle (abridged)
Waltzing Matilda
Nine miles from Gundagai
Selected - Jackie French says "this book should have been so big you would need a forklift to carry it and a million dollars to buy it." "For every (poem) we included there were 20 more we wanted to cram in."
For children - The opening page reads like a table of contents. It does not cover every poem but I love the inclusion of headings such as:
If you are in primary school you may like ...
If you think poetry is boring, try:
If you want poems to sing to, look up:
If you want a poem of courage to help you face tomorrow:
I adore this new book. I plan to gift it to an adult friend of mine who also loves poetry. There is so much to enjoy. The illustrations are just beautiful. Some fill a whole page. I imagine they took many months to produce. Some of the best take the reader way beyond the words of the poem. The care taken with the illustrations reminds me of another fabulous poetry book I talked about recently - I am the seed that grew the tree.
From the moment I spied this book I knew it was special and then as a bonus I discovered it contains one of my most favourite Australian poems. I recited this poem as part of a country town drama group production called 'Yarns and Woolly Tales'. I still find the final lines quite chilling. The words of this poem remind me of this famous painting entitled "On the Wallaby Track'.
Image source: https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/collection/works/572/
Before the glare of dawn I rise
To milk the sleeping cows, n' shake
the droving dust from tired eyes.
Look round the rabbit traps, then bake
The children's bread.
There's hay to stook, an' beans to hoe,
An' ferns to cut in the scrub below,
Women must work, when men must go
Shearing from shed to shed.
I patch an' darn, now evening comes,
An' tired I am with labour sore,
Tired o' the bush, the cows, the gums,
Tired, but we must dree for long months more
What no tongue tells.
The moon is lonely in the sky,
Lonely the bush, an' lonely I
Stare down the track no horse draws nigh.
An' start ... at the cattle bells.
There are many other poems in this book that I would love to share with a group of children. The poems about the Anzacs would be excellent to use for a school commemoration. I also recommend you read Rainforest Song by Libby Hathorn and I Met a Man by Janeen Brian and the amazing poems by Shaun Tan too. You will find so many treasures every time you dip into this wonderful poetry collection.
Page after glorious page of amazing verse accompanied by Tania’s iconic illustrations, it is pure joy to hold, read and savour. Just So Stories Sue Warren
No comments:
Post a Comment