Stevenson's Garden: Verse Is Verse

Accost a fellow academic and mention children's poetry. Whom do they know? One poet, a versifier named Robert Louis Stevenson.

"He captured so well childhood and the spirit of children's play." Or, "Of course, it's verse not poetry, but that's good enough for children. Besides, what else is there?"

It is past time to take a hard look at A Child's Garden of Verses, to apply to that classic the criteria of poetry—compactness, figurativeness, rhythm and sound patterns, and emotional intensity.

But first, a few concessions.

Some children may still play pirates; many set their boats afloat on tiny streams, and play with toy figures on the bedspread—though rarely with lead soldiers upon the counterpane. They march to tunes, but not always martial ones. They marvel at adults, but far less often at "nursie's" kindess, or the transformation brought about by lamplighters. They prefer the adventures of the astronaut, or even the clatter of the trash collectors below their windows. Most certainly children still love to go up in the swing, and to wonder at their shadows that shrink, then grow, then even disappear. And no one will ever be blase about how in every empty cup, "the sea came up / till it could come no more."

Once we put behind us, however, the fact that we first heard the verses read to us by attentive adults, we see them more objectively. Even the most casual critic is aware of the cliches, the lack of compactness, the plethora of throwaway words: "All in the pleasant open air, / All in the pleasant light of day"; "It is very nice to think"; "As plain as day before my eye" (to rhyme with "by"); "Must we to bed, indeed? Well, then, / Let us arise and go like men." Even children parading to music are drably described: "All carrying different kinds of things."

Stevenson's verses lack intensity; they are grayed with abstract and non-sensory adjectives like "merry," "pleasant," "jolly," and "sweet." Although children do "rise," "leave," and "come," the most frequently used verbs are forms of "to be." For variation Stevenson lapses into verbal antiques like "fare," "dwell," or "put by," just perhaps the terms used by Victorian children. Such bland wordiness shows no conviction that children lose themselves in play. The idea of making a ship upon the stairs, for example, is all that lingers from that verse. Nothing that is vivid remains, for no true experience is recounted: "We had the best of plays."

Rhythm and sound patterns are equally disappointing. Ignoring the use of rhythm and sound to enhance and intensify meaning, Stevenson's regular beat plods along in solemn iambs. More than that, to create lines of equal length, he pads the lines, resorting to empty words like those in "The Moon.""Butallof the things that belong to the day / Cuddle to sleep to be out of her way."

No only do words exist only for regular da-dah / da-dah / da-dah meter—a solemn choice for scenes of play—but the verses of A Child's Garden are also forced into rhyme. In "Travel" we read that eastern cities for miles about "Are with mosque and minaret / Among sandy gardens set," and later on, "Where in jungles, near and far, / Man-devouring tigers are." The verse closes with "And flowers and children close their eyes / Till up in the morning the sun shall rise." Ignoring phonetic intensives, onomatopoeia and other devices of sound, Stevenson's verse exemplifies a condescending attitude toward poetry for children. It has two qualities—rhythm, regular and obvious, and rhyme in abab or aabb patterns. To fulfill these obligations, he does anything, forcing lines into the most banal of rhymes: sings/things; trees/sees; Japan/man; Spain/rain ("Singing").

Perhaps for those who still cling to Stevenson's collection as the best for children, it was their only book of poems in childhood. Perhaps they surround that book with subliminal memories of a parent's lap, and a parent's voice. At the time, the rhythm and rhyme may...