Customer Reviews

The Space Child's Mother Goose

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Rubber-band mathematics, telekenisis, Moebius strips and Klein bottles, multi-dimensional space-folds, a model of a scientific theory, postulates and relative time frames would not seem to be material suitable for children, but this slim book will quickly disabuse you of that idea. This book is a marvelous re-working of the old Mother Goose rhymes, updated to today's scientifically oriented world.

I first read this book just after it was published, when I was about eleven years old, and was immediately captivated. It made no difference that I didn't understand some of the terms being used. The thing that caught me was the skill with which these modern-day and science-fictional items were folded into those well known rhymes, how well they fit and gave new, quite twisted, and in many cases hysterically funny meaning to them. Reading them today, these verses are still just as funny, if not more so than I found them to be in my youth, as I now can catch the fact that Winsor buried many sly references to Greek literature, outmoded scientific theories, and even satire about academic politics within their brief lines. My favorite along this latter line is `The Theory that Jack Built', which contains a fatal flaw, hidden by mummery, obfuscation, and bells and whistles, which all gets blown away when the Space Child presses the `Go' button.

The illustrations are just as marvelous, and do much to help someone who might not completely understand the scientific terms to see just what is being referenced, while being very individualistic in style and maintaining the humorous tone of the whole book. Along with these visual aids, there are often `definitions' at the bottom of the page, some even more abstruse than the item being defined, but just as funny.

Don't forget to read the `Answers' at the back of the book, which in addition to some appropriate real definitions, also provide some rather unique explanations of some of the terms used in this book, including one which takes a viscous dig at Congress.

Give this one to your son or daughter, but not till you've read it yourself. You might get a few questions, and there might be a few puzzled frowns, but I'd almost guarantee you'll also be the recipient of some laughs and smiles.

--- Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)

Probable-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.

Several pages later:

Plusque-Posible ma poule noire

Elle ? ses oeufs dans le quand-provisoir

I could also try to remember the German by memory. But already I must admit to pretty poor french. The above English is pretty close to the original, I'm sure.

I think this the funniest trick in this very funny book. Schwarz-henn shows up also in great hieroglyphics, and in Greek with an off-base pedantic translation back into English.

It is a great disappointment that she is out of print. My copy was given me by my sister, the only person who could always pick for me what I wanted, when I was a Naval Officer living in pre Viet Nam Japan. I have just tried to purchase it for a 5 year old piano student who plays the works Mozart wrote at age 5 and who can solve linear equations for two unknowns.

Give it, if you can get it, to any progressive adult or child and you and he will be blessed!

I was born in 1952. This is the second book I remember having owning, after Dr Suess. I can't place the year exactly, but it was in the 50s.

I still have that first copy. I still read it. I enjoy it just as much or more now than I did way back when dinasoars roamed the earth.

Books don't come any better than this.

My sister bought this book at a used book sale in Phoenix in the 70s, joined a cult, and left this book to me. She's never getting it back either! For those of you who love science fiction, science, poetry, languages and charming drawings, this is the book for you! I've shared it with my math and science fiction instructors at Arizona State, and they loved it. Where else would you get to read about the Little Black Hen in Greek and Swahili? The book expands one's imagination and obliterates any preconceptions that scientists are obtuse--in addition to knowing their specific sciences,these folks write poetry, draw, and are multilingual!

I stumbled accross this book in the library of a high-school (when I was in about grade 10 -- not so long ago). A few years after I graduated, I realized I was smitten by the charmingly antiquated poems and I knew that I had to get a copy. I found some copies for sale on the internet, ranging up to $500.00 US for a copy! I even called rare book shops, and the nose-in-the-air shopkeeps had the nerve to scoff. I eventually got my friend to get his sister to bribe the librarian to get it for me. Who's laughing now? It is a first printing, and it was bought by the high-school in 1963 for $3.00! I read it at least once a month. I can't believe how little popularity this book has gained, considering the prescience of the writing. Oh well. I love it, and I share it with others who appreciate it: "Divide command and court disaster / Pollux says, and so says Castor" If you ever see a copy, snatch it up. It's valuable as a collector's item, but priceless as a memento.

Okay I admit it I am biased. Frederick Winsor was my grandfather. I never knew him alas, but his infectious rhymes were part of my childhood. My 8-year-old son loves them too. Especially his version of hickory dickory dock. "Flappity, floppity, flip, the mouse on the Moebius strip, the strip revolved, the mouse disolved, in a chrono-dimensional skip." There is a glossary at the end that (sort of) explains the scientific terms.

Written in 1958, at the dawn of the Space Age, this charming collection of updated Mother Goose rhymes by Frederick Winsor is supplemented with the delightful pen-and-ink illustrations of Marian Parry. Originally published in _The_Atlantic_, these updated poems are not satirical or mocking of either the original verses, or of the new ideas they incorporate. While some might think they are too intellectually advanced for children, and are intended for high-school age and up, they made perfect sense to this reviewer at age 6. Fanciful verse definitions accompany poems with lesser-known terms, and an extensive glossary is provided at the end. While this book is now out-of-print, editons are still possible to find. Perhaps if enough of a new generation discovers its pleasures, we will see it back on the shelves by popular demand.

One of the guilty pleasures of reading Old SF, is seeing just how badly the imagined futures of the past tend to hold up, "..as the room-sized master computer blinked and clacked in the background, our hero picked up the heavy handset and dialed the number of the rocket taxi company on the black and white rotary video phone...", but you will have to forego such joys with this surprisingly modern half-century old wonder. Not to worry, though, because the timeless hilarity more than makes up for it!

Contained within its covers are some 45 hysterically modernized Mother Goose classics with a few originals tossed in, charmingly illustrated by Marian Parry's deceptively simple line drawings, ending with a useful though slightly warped glossary to help you (or hinder you as the case may be) in getting the jokes. (Some recourse to an unabridged dictionary or a good encyclopedia may also be required.) Open the book, and you will enter a marvelously twisted universe in which Miss Muffet's arachnophobia is eased by a force field, Little Jack Horner extracts cube roots, three men go to sea in a Klein bottle, and Jack builds a Theory.

Defects? None that I can think of! One can argue that many of the in jokes will not be gotten by young children but such is true of the original nursery rhymes: Heavy Words Lightly Thrown: The Reason Behind the Rhyme. Frederick Winsor tragically passed away while working on a sequel, but one might hope to someday see an expanded edition containing whatever he managed to produce before his death. Meanwhile, thanks to Purple House Press, here is a back in print book you won't mind reading over and over to your children...

in fact your children might have to remind you to quit giggling about it all to yourself and share the fun!

This wonderful little book is one that I have owned several times since I first read it around 1961. Unfortunately, every time I managed to find a copy, I loaned it to someone. Of the several people I loaned each hard-won copy, none ever returned it. I guess that means people like it. For me, it has been a never-ending source of delight, even though I didn't understand most of it when I first read it at the age of 12. (Be warned: This is not a book for children. Nothing offensive; they just won't get it.) This time, I am not loaning my copy. Get your own. (And thanks, Amazon.)

I found my copy of this classic the year it was published ___ in the infant's book section of a Toledo department store. The book buyer hadn't yet cottoned on to just what the little gem was all about. [We did, however, read these "nursery rhymes" to all our kids .... and the neighbours' kids as well.

The only author with a similar bent that comes to mind is Piet Hein.

When books of this caliber go [and stay] out of print, all I can say is, "Thank the Good Lord for the gift of the photocopier!"