In the long and varied history of Ms. Mother Goose, so many collections and books of nursery rhymes have been made that it's a wonder anyone keeps track anymore. Certainly I was a child when this particular treasury originally came out and until my current grown state I'd never even heard of it. Illustrated by Arnold Lobel (the nice man who introduced the world to "Frog and Toad") this book is nothing if not extensive. It runs the gamut of rhymes, from classics like "Three Blind Mice" to limericks to tongue-twisters. It is a breathtaking achievement.Many a nursery rhyme book, if extensive, will place two or three rhymes on a page and choose to illustrate only one. Not so Mr. Lobel. It is with great manual dexterity that he has found ways to merge, combine and bring together like-rhymes so as to combine their illustrations into a single motif. Consider his page containing romantic poems. Under around and through a single arbor dwell characters that act out such poems as "Something old, something new", "I love coffee", "Roses are red", and "If you love me, love me true". Poems about the weather, food, and royalty are similarly grouped. Longer poems, such as the classic "Partridge in a pear tree" are given full page multi-spreads. Lobel is nothing if not meticulous in his craft.
I did have an occasional objection. Though the book is expertly indexed, there is not so much as an author's note or preface explaining where he got these poems. The title page merely reads, "Selected and illustrated by Arnold Lobel", with scant attention to exactly WHERE he got them. This isn't idle curiosity either. More than one of these poems contains wordings different from those known to the pubic at large. For example, instead of the poem "London Bridge is falling down" we read that "London Bridge is broken down". Or smaller changes, such as making a ha' penny a half penny in "Christmas is coming".
Diligent parents beware. This book abounds with capital punishment and death. Much like the early fairy tales, nursery rhymes weren't always for the kiddie set. Adults liked them just as much. In the edition I happened to borrow from the library, some extraordinarily concerned parents took offense to a couple phrases in "This is the house that Jack built" (changing "That killed the rat" to "That bumped the rat" and "That waked the priest all shaved and shorn" to "That waked the minister all shaved and shorn"). Oog.
In the end, this is really a fabulous collection. The illustrations are adept (containing some very funny interpretations as well) and the rhymes not only familiar but enjoyable. If you don't mind the occasional change to the text here and there it is well worth your casual perusal and enjoyment.
