THE CAMEL'S LAMENT
Charles E. Carryl, , illus. by Charles Santore. . Random, $16.95 (32pp) ISBN 978-0-375-81426-6
A camel's whiny yet comical complaint in this turn-of-the-century light verse serves as springboard for Santore's imaginative and droll illustrations. "Puppies are able to sleep in a stable,/ and oysters can slumber in pails./ But no one supposes/ a poor camel dozes—/ anyplace does for me!" Carryl writes in the same vein as contemporaries Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll, and though his poetry may not be as memorable, it unwinds with a lilting rhythm. Each stanza lists how, in the camel's opinion, other animals are better housed, fed and used, but the end of the poem contains neither a surprise nor a satisfying conclusion (his final beef: the other animals have better shapes, "But a camel's all lumpy/ and bumpy and humpy—/
Reviewed on: 10/18/2004
Genre: Children's
Hardcover - 32 pages - 978-1-64643-018-5
Library Binding - 1 pages - 978-0-375-91426-3