New Poetry: Edgar Allan Poe's Pie

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Lewis, J. Patrick. 2012. Edgar Allan Poe’s Pie. Ill. by Michael Slack. New York: Harcourt Children’s Books. ISBN 9780547513386

 

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

J. Patrick Lewis, who was named Children’s Poet Laureate in 2011, is known for his witty and clever children’s poetry. Lewis parodies many historically famous poems in his new book Edgar Allan Poe’s Pie. In addition to satire, Lewis incorporates mathematic riddles in each poem.

Several poems are nonsensical with no deeper meaning other than the mathematic puzzle. The rhythm of the poem varies as it attempts to follow the rhythm of the original piece—even “Emily Dickinson’s Phone Book” which includes Dickinson’s signature dashes. Some poems follow an organized rhyme scheme including rhyme within lines as in the title piece, “Edgar Allen Poe’s Pie.”

The math problems embedded in each poem will have readers carefully reading and rereading every poem in order to gather all the information necessary to solve the problem. The craziness of the poems—regardless of the closeness to the original poem—will intrigue readers and keep them interested.

While the book in general is geared toward readers around grades 3-8 (depending on the difficulty of the math), older readers who have studied the original poems and poets (Dickinson, Milne, and Frost, to name a few) will appreciate the correlation and parody.

Lewis cleverly includes math concepts into the poems without compromising the meaning of the satire. Readers will understand the general meaning of the poem even if the level of mathematics is too high. Lewis provides the answers and methods for solving each problem in small, upside down font at the bottom of the poem’s page.

As help for the reader, Lewis includes a table of contents with page numbers for quick access to a particular piece. Illustrator Michael Slack features colorful, whimsical pictures to accompany each poem. The layout of the poems on the page allows the illustration to complement the poem without taking over.

In honor of the original poem, Lewis notes which poem/poet he parodies under the title of his poem. At the end of the book, Lewis provides brief biographical prose about the poets he parodied.

Because of the nature of the poems found in Edgar Allan Poe’s Pie, the book can be used to address cross-curricular skills in math and language arts. Regardless of the motive for reading the book, readers will enjoy Lewis’ signature style of work and play!

POETRY SPOTLIGHT

“Emily Dickinson’s Telephone Book”

Inspired by “My Life Closed Twice Before Its Close” by Emily Dickinson

My book closed twice before its close—

The two opposing pages

That added up to 113—

Were smudged around the edges—

At noon I opened it again—

When waking—from my slumbers.

The phone book so befuddles me—

What were those two page numbers?

“Emily Dickinson’s Telephone Book” can be read in a number of ways. To first introduce it, however, I recommend one voice reading the poem in order to emphasize the rhythm (especially noting the dashes). Follow up by allowing all readers to read in unison, or form two groups—one assigned to read each stanza.

The uniqueness of this book is twofold: parody of a famous poem and math riddle. The idea of embedding a math problem into a poem is clever and intriguing. Challenge students to create their own satirical poem complete with a math puzzle and solution.

To follow the form of the book, give readers several popular poems after which they can model their poem. Suggested poets from who you may borrow poems include Shel Silverstein, Jack Prelutsky, Douglas Florian, and of course, J. Patrick Lewis!

Once the poem in written, allow students to illustrate their poems using collage style, watercolors, or photograph.

Answer: 113 divided by 2 = 56.5;

rounding 56.5 up and down = pages 56 and 57.