X. J. Kennedy, Author . Johns Hopkins Univ. $14.95 (112p) ISBN 978-0-8018-7168-9
New England's master of light verse returns to familiarly sardonic territory in this, his seventh collection, which mixes dry wit and restrained verse-narrative with poems on surprisingly serious subjects. Among the latter: a mentally ill failed
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X. J. Kennedy, Author . BOA $21.95 (118p) ISBN 978-1-929918-95-9
Accompanying Kennedy's forthcoming selected (serious) poems, this agreeably cantankerous, occasionally laugh-out-loud-funny volume gathers brief parodies, barbed rhymes, naughty couplets and other assorted not-so-serious verse, dating (despite...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author BOA Editions $17 (118p) ISBN 978-1-929918-96-6
Accompanying Kennedy's forthcoming selected (serious) poems, this agreeably cantankerous, occasionally laugh-out-loud-funny volume gathers brief parodies, barbed rhymes, naughty couplets and other assorted not-so-serious verse, dating (despite the...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author Johns Hopkins University Press $0 (88p) ISBN 978-0-8018-4484-3
Kennedy, a prototype for many ``new formalist'' poets, is a painstaking craftsman whose work straddles that thin line between verse and poetry. At his weakest, he writes incidental poems commemorating late-night phone calls or a town dump. He's...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author Margaret K. McElderry Books $16 (192p) ISBN 978-0-689-81157-9
The eagle of the title is not much more than 40 feet wide, and the rest of this sequel to The Owlstone Crown proves similarly hyperbolic. The narrator, Timothy, and his twin sister, legally blind weight-lifter Verity, live in the Land of the...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author, Jane Dyer, Author, Dorothy M. Kennedy, Editor Little, Brown Books for Young Readers $21.95 (96p) ISBN 978-0-316-48889-1
In both content and design this is an unusually striking anthology. The title, from Isak Dinesen's Out of Africa (``Speak again. Speak like rain''), provides a selection basis for the more than 120 poems, handily grouped in such sections as ``Wind...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author, Ron Barrett, Illustrator Margaret K. McElderry Books $13.95 (56p) ISBN 978-0-689-50477-8
The rhymes and nonsense verse in this slim volume will enchant Kennedy's fans. Although not all of the poems are equally clever or well-phrased, all are guaranteed to be zany. Aunt Gilda, for example, ``wears twelve hat pins / All sticking out, so...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author, Joy Allen, Illustrator Little, Brown Books for Young Readers $16.99 (128p) ISBN 978-0-316-38423-0
X.J. Kennedy offers a plethora of poetry and tickles the funny bone in Exploding Gravy: Poems to Make You Laugh, illus. by Joy Allen. Some of the poems have been published in previous anthologies, but the poet's fans will welcome this extensive ...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author, Marian Young, Illustrator Margaret K. McElderry Books $13.95 (85p) ISBN 978-0-689-50507-2
Like the ``Poet'' he describes, Kennedy talks ``in stumbles and bumps'' when ``Over a word's back another word jumps / And when it comes down there's a jingle.'' Although not as consistently successful as his other verse anthologies ( Brats ;...
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X. J. Kennedy, Author, Graham Percy, Illustrator Philomel Books $16.99 (48p) ISBN 978-0-399-23428-6
Just in time for the winter games, X.J. Kennedy follows up Elympics with Elefantina's Dream, illus. by Graham Percy. Here, the plucky pachyderm straps on her ice skates and, with the aid of a friend and the local ice man, not only makes the...
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