The Unidentified Frying Omelette

Teachers who have sought in vain for examples of some of the more esoteric poetic forms specified by the English National Curriculum may welcome this anthology. Peters has selected examples from a range of (mainly) modern children's poets. Everything from Acrostic to Villanelle is here, with notes on all the different forms at the end. The emphasis is on the humorous and the range of subjects now thought likely to get children's attention - food, football, school life and teenage crushes - and Chris Mould's black and white cartoons fit these preoccupations well. Of course, you need to know how a form was used conventionally before you can appreciate a parody, so some dead poets, like Hopkins, Marvell and Shakespeare, do appear. Nevertheless, the range is restricted, and it may be that this collection would be used best in conjunction with more traditional ones, when its playfulness and irony would stand out. It would be a pity, for instance, if Peters' example - 'The Bog-Standard Ballad' - were the only ballad that children met.