3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great, challenging poetry for children and adults, December 14, 1998
By A Customer
This review is from: The Ballad of Biddy Early (Hardcover)
Nancy Willard is probably best known as a children's poet for her justly celebrated William Blake's Inn, but to my taste this book surpasses the better-known one. Like William Blake's Inn, this book consists of a cycle of poems, most of them roughly in ballad style, some mainly narrative and some mainly lyrical, some more whimsical than others, some quite complex. The central character is a "wise woman of Clare" who communes with animals and helps those in need (including a gypsy queen and a poor man who has killed his landlord). The poems are far from simple, but they are consistently affecting and satisfying both to children and to adults. I have loved reading it to my children, and I have found it to be a wonderful introduction to the pleasures of "real" poetry for them - this is real poetry, not doggerel at all, although written to be appreciated by children. I wish I could find more copies in print.
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