Shel Silverstein and Me

I definitely read Silverstein when I was a kid. I would check his books out from the library, or we may have even owned a couple. In middle school, I checked out an audio version of own of his poetry collections - one that he read himself. I remember being surprised that an adult could be so earnest about such silly things.

Recently, I have been methodically going through as many works of his as the Los Angeles City Library systems has. It's been an interesting journey. After finishing most of his children's books, I moved on to what he'd written/drawn for adults. There were the cartoons for playboy, his book Different Dances and a play called "The Devil and Billy Markham." And just today I finished Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book. Despite the fact that the book cover advertises him as the author of A Light in the Attic and despite the fact that the library has cataloged this as a children's book (XZ), it really isn't for kids. At least not young kids, or gullible kids, or kids without a bit of a demented sense of humor. I think this is a book we owned when I was younger, and I remember reading and knowing that all thing things in the book (drinking lye, pulling on a lion's tail, asking everyone where babies come from) were jokes and meant to poke fun at kids. I'm not sure at what age I would give a child this book. If they were cool, maybe eight?

What's impressive to me about Silverstein is that he was able to live in both worlds. He had his books and cartoons for adults and his books and cartoons for children and no one got in an uproar about how in addition to cute poems about polka dots, he'd also been known to draw naked women. True, maybe there were people who were mad about that, but I feel like we have a harder time separating such things today. Like, it seems like you have to pick one or the other and being creative and inspiring in both the adult world and the children's world is not an option. Maybe it's because of the internet. Knowledge is so readily available and we love to pass judgement.

Anyway, even if I do find his drawings just on the wrong side of creepy (always have, not sure why ... too accurate? too grotesque?) this is a man I respect and enjoy the work of.