Make 'em Laugh....

...or what I was supposed to present at KSRA before the interference of Frankenstorm...

    The Cat in the Hat would never have come back if Alice hadn't fallen down the rabbit hole.  There was really nothing funny at all in children's literature until Alice's Adventures in Wonderland arrived on bookshelves in 1865.  Yes, back in 1744 when A Little Pretty Pocket-Book Intended for the Instruction and Amusement of Little Master Tommy and Pretty Miss Polly was published, there wasn't much  to be amused about.  John Newbery was too busy teaching morals and 'rules of life'  along with the alphabet and a proverb or two.  (Though I dare say reading it aloud now is hilarious:   "Spit not forth any Thing that is not convenient to be swallowed, as the Stones of Plumbs, Cherries, or such like; but with Thy left hand, neatly move them to the Side of thy Plate" or "Smell not of thy Meat, nor put it to thy Nose; turn it not the other Side upward to view it upon Thy plate.")
    Well, it is 2012 and children's author Dan Greenburg, speaking a few years ago at an SCBWI Conference noted that the funniest word in the English language for kids is UNDERPANTS.  Of course it is. Why else would we have Captain Underpants, Underpants Thunderpants, Aliens Love Underpants, Dinosaurs Love Underpants, and The Underpants Zoo? Lest we need a reason to use humor in children's writing, there is plenty of documentation of its benefits: increased endorphin and dopamine release, increased relaxation response, increased creativity, improved problem solving skills and enhanced memory. Why shouldn't we make kids laugh? 
   
    Humor in children's literature is divided roughly into four categories:
****Physical Humor
****Wordplay
****Humor of Character
****Humor of Situation
These categories coincide with children's developmental levels.  Physical humor is much like physical comedy (very visual) and can be found in books like The Cat in the Hat, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, or I Want My Hat Back.

Wordplay is showcased in Runny Babbit and Amelia Bedelia,
Humor of Character with characters like Clifford the Big Red Dog, or Olivia
and Humor of Situation readily apparent in Dear Mrs. LaRue Letters from Obedience Camp or Click Clack Moo Cows that Type.

As most of my children's poetry is of the zany or nonsensical type, my school visit workshops are most often conducted with a humorous bent.  We write about insects from the their own point of view: what do spiders need these eight legs for?  What happens when a grasshopper wants to just take a walk? Does a ladybug have to act like a lady?
  Or pull out a map and ask kids what the people from Toast, North Carolina, Wink, Texas, or Embarrass, Minnesota like to be called?
  Suppose "There once was a monster named Dave, Who didn't know how to behave?" What do they teach in monster school if you like to bake cookies?
  Could a trout have a superpower?
  Or sometimes we just see what kind of a couplet we can make out of the words vanilla and gorilla.
  What kind of a creature is a SPLONK?
Engaging children with humor will reap huge rewards - and it makes the instructor feel good too.




   

Thank You, Theodor

Dear Dr. Seuss,

it is truer than true,

the person I'm thankfullest for

would be you.

The people who know me best, incorrigible rhymeaholic that I am, will not be surprised that Dr. Seuss is who I feel most indebted to and most inspired by during this month of giving thanks.  I wanted to grow up to rhyme just like he did.  And back in 2003 when a reviewer of Here's What You Do When You Can't Find Your Shoe called it "...high-spirited verse of the light variety, enhanced by Seussian silliness...", I knew I could die a happy woman. 

Growing up, loving Dr. Seuss was a family affair.  My sisters and I were performing The Big Brag here in 1967 at our grandparents' house.  You can't really tell, but it was standing room only.  We brought the house down, or perhaps it was just the Christmas tree that later came down behind my sister Anne during an encore performance... 
Dr. Seuss' "unique nonsense books for children" were right up our alley.  In a family of eight children, who wouldn't love a story about a woman who had 23 sons and named them all Dave?  We loved every Sneetch and Lorax, every Umbus and Thnad. It was all so wonderfully silly.  Green Eggs and Ham? The Cat in the Hat? We loved performing the stories just to be a part of them, albeit briefly.  At the time I remember thinking the rhyme made it easier to memorize, or perhaps it was just that we'd already read our lines over and over and over again because we loved how Seuss tickled our tongues.
Fast forward now to me the children's author, rhyming along poem by poem.  I finally get a contract for my first book with Caitlyn Dlouhy at Atheneum and am thrilled. But what does she tell me that very same day? That rhyme is nearly impossible to sell since so much of it is done so poorly.  Curses! But I am not daunted.  That same year Hooray for Diffendoofer Day is published, begun by Dr. Seuss but completed by Jack Prelutsky and Lane Smith.  And in the back of the book, the most fabulous thing I've ever seen.  Reproductions of original  notes for the book - rough drafts that showed Dr. Seuss searching for just the right word, trying out different names for the school, for the teachers, crossing out some, adding others, scribbling and scratching along until he got it just right.  I don't know why I'd ever assumed that he just wrote one perfect version of everything, but this evidence of the trial and error way that even the great Dr. Seuss wrote made me feel validated. Rhyme didn't come so very easily to him all the time either! So I still love rhyme and I still write rhyme and I still get to read Dr. Seuss.  Have you seen the new/old The Bippolo Seed and Other Lost Stories?

Yes, woe be to he

who is rhymeless and Seussless

for such an existence

is utterly useless.

Be thankful this Thursday

for turkey or goose,

while in my own home

I'll be thankful for Seuss.