Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #21133 in Books
• Published on: 1976-05-04
• Binding: Paperback
• 64 pages

Customer Reviews

T S Eliot's Fun Side.
What a pleasure it is to read these poems which T S Eliot wrote for his godchildren.

His own brand of fun and wit is so clever and so brilliantly controlled that it must have been great fun to hear him read them. His great skill with words and the sounds and musicality of his poems ring through these poems and it is a joy to know that the world now knows the "Jellicle Cats' and "Pollicle Dogs'as well as those long ago children must have known them.

Purrrrrfect!
Old possoms book of poems is wicked, as an andrew Lloyed Webber fan I can see all the cats as I read this amazing work of art.

A Great Work
Although easily outselling The Wasteland or, probably, all of Eliot's other works put together, this richly worded collection is frequently dismissed by critics as frivolous. The poems are rarely included in Eliot anthologies and are probably much more frequently read by children than by adults.

However, there is much in Old Possum to intrigue the literary critic - as well as his/her child.

Firstly, the mixture of sounds, the repetition and the language are all distincly Eliot's own. His recurrent themes of the passing of time and nostalgia are all there, and couched in a glorious rhythm so in tune with, say, Four Quartents, that it does not take an expert to find the similarities.

To the child: read this book for fun. To the adult familiar with Eliot's less accessible works: read it to remind yourself of the man behind the poet.