Consider the Lemming

Gr 5 Up--Thirty animal poems, accompanied by William Steig's familiar comic drawings, roll along rhythmically in this small book. Jeanne Steig favors couplets and quatrains and includes a few limericks in consideration of pigs and giraffes, the stork and the penguin, the mythical manticore, and, finally, the human race. While the verses skim along quickly, and the art on the book jacket is reminiscent of William Steig's picture books, many words, allusions, and innuendoes will most resonate with adult readers. The beaver "can gnaw through a tree/While you pour the Chablis./He's a consummate overachiever." The lemming doesn't shilly or shally or dilly or dally in its wild migration to the water. "A lem to the slaughter!/Don't ask him 'Who sent ya?'/It must be dementia--unless it's ennui." There are plenty of quick chuckles for older readers. "We talk about the bull a lot.... We take him by the horns in daring/and name him when we fall to swearing./Sometimes we shoot the bull. Poor Taurus!/He must--how could he not--abhor us." The absurdity of the stork bringing "new babies, tucked in little slings" and the need for Adam and Eve to leave Eden are fun spoofs of human lore. "The need arose in apple season. It's called the Fall, for just that reason." The work all bears much earlier copyrights, but the clean format with William Steig's spare black-and-white sketches and Jeanne Steig's deft patter still seem fresh, offering enjoyable perusing and many good read-aloud possibilities for mature audiences.--Margaret Bush, Simmons College, Boston