Editorial

Dear Bookbird Readers,

In this issue we are pleased to gather a collection of pieces all focused on the topic of poetry for young people, from classics to contemporary poetry, nonsense to novels-in-poems, the cultural to the political, sharing perspectives on the genre in Korea, Slovenia, Greece, Slovakia, Romania, France, and beyond. Poetry presents some unique challenges for an international audience—it doesn’t translate well. That is, a poem can be beautifully musical in one language, but the translation may only be able to capture the words and language and not the musicality or imagery or even humor. Thus, we have tried to include the poems here in both the original language and English wherever possible. We are so pleased to feature the poetry of JonArno Lawson, Helen Frost, Alain Serres, Iordan Chimet, Oton Župančič, Niko Grafenauer, Miroslav Košuta, Dane Zajc, Yiannis Ritsos, Dimitris Manthopoulos, Pavlina Pampoudi, Theti Chortiati, Daniel Hevier, Elena Čepčeková, Krista Bendová, L’bomír Feldek, Miroslav Válek, Dong-min Ju, Pablo Neruda, Shuntaro Tanikawa, and even by children themselves throughout the pages of this issue.

Three articles consider the cultural aspects of poetry for young people within their own countries and across other national contexts. The first article by Darja Mazi-Leskovar discusses images of Africa as they appear in motifs of animals, history, and landscapes in Slovenian poetry. She gives careful consideration to how these poems encourage interest in what is foreign and what is common between the domestic environment of Slovenian readers and the African continent. Yoo Kyung Sung and Eun Hye Son follow with their examination of fourteen Korean picture books that feature traditional songs, labor songs, children’s songs, and classic and contemporary poems. They analyze the diverse cultural and linguistic aspects of Korea that are revealed in these works. Tasoula Tsilimeni and Petros Panaou discuss the two major movements in poetry for children in Greece with a special focus on the themes, forms, and types prevalent in contemporary poetry.

Two articles take a political perspective on poetry, including Markéta Andričíková’s and Timotea Vráblová’s study of the Slovak movement of “nonsense poetry” for children with a particular focus on the changing historical and political context and Marina Debattista’s exploration of the links between Surrealism and the remembrance of childhood through an anthology created by Romanian poet Iordan Chimet, The Twelve Months of Dreaming.

Joann McFerran Mount analyzes how the life and work of Chilean poet and Nobel Laureate Pablo Neruda is revealed in six key books written for children in English and Spanish. Choices in content, authorship, and presentation are carefully considered. Françoise Ballanger offers an in-depth interview with Alain Serres, a French writer, poet, and publisher of children’s books [Rue du monde; Street of the world]; Serres discusses his goal of sharing poetry from around the world with children of all ages.

The final two articles address international exchanges through poetry. First, Helen Frost writes about her experiences as a visiting poet in two schools, Northwood Middle School, in Fort Wayne, Indiana in the United States and Castlebay School, on the Isle of Barra in the Western Isles of Scotland, and how students connect with each other through her novel in poems, The Braid. David Colmer describes the innovative Dutch-based Poem Express, an international poem poster competition for children aged six to thirteen that involves a network of national and regional organizations around the world.

In our Books on Books department, you will find fascinating reviews of five new resource books, including a look at the state of European children’s literature featured at a notable conference organized by the National Library of France (Bibliothèque Nationale de France), a German study of the use of the fairy tale in comparing different South Slavic cultures, a narratological analysis also from Germany of forms and structures in books for children and young adults, a comprehensive examination of Slovak children’s literature from the Centre for Information on Literature (Literárne Informačné Centrum – LIC) in Slovakia, and...