Michael Rosen (1) (1946–)

The longest poem in the book, Chocolate Cake, is about a little boy who can't get out of his mind the delicious chocolate cake he had for tea. He creeps out of bed at night (carefully over the creaky floorboard by his parents' bedroom), goes down to the fridge and 'tidies' the cake, side by side, evens it out, picks up the crumbs and little by little the whole cake is eventually eaten. This is all described in the most excruciating detail. Excruciating because you are with the little boy and show more you don't want him to get caught (you did this too, didn't you?) He is caught, but not till the next day and oh, it's so humiliating.

This, along with Bananas in My Ears (a really, really stupid story about having bananas in your ears so you can't hear anything) which has no point at all, but all children find so hilarious they really do end up with tears in their eyes from too much laughing, forms the absolute high point of well-written English humour for children. With writing like this, we all become children. As we grow up we forget what it is to be a child, to think like a child, but Michael Rosen hasn't, and his poems and silly stories bring us back to that.

Highly recommended for everyone above ground and especially if they have an under-ten year old within laughing distance. show less

The Nature of the Beast

Grief waxes and wanes.
It is a beast of many faces, many forms.
It cowers in the shadows, then tiptoes gently, bearing warm, sad, poignant memories.
Occasionally, it wanders off for two or three days.
Then it pounces, baring its teeth, and drawing blood and tears.

Some days I feel almost “normal”, and others, even three months later, I’m tearful all day. Most of the time, it’s somewhere in between, with a mask to cover the cracks, and spare others from dealing show more with my pain.

Losing my father, who was only 77 and in good health, with no warning at all, is my first encounter with raw grief of someone very close.

I’m not a spiritual person and have not sought solace in religion.

My pain is uniquely my own, and has reopened wider family complexities that go beyond what would be suitable for a bereavement group.

For weeks, I could barely read.

I talk: to myself, my family, my friends, and recently, a therapist, but mostly to myself.

But books call, speak, and soothe. Somehow I found my way to this short picture book.

Image: ”He doesn’t say anything, because he’s not there any more.” The empty cell says it all.

Why This Book?

This is only the second book explicitly tied to bereavement I’ve picked up. (The first, was Mary Oliver’s poetry collection, Thirst, which I reviewed HERE). I don’t normally read, let alone seek out children’s books (unless there’s a child around), but I’m glad I did.

“Sad is a place
that is deep and dark
like the space
under the bed

sad is a place
that is high and light
like the sky
above my head

When it’s deep and dark
I don’t dare go there

When it’s high and light
I want to be thin air.”

Who’s This For?

I never had to face close bereavement in childhood: I lost my grandparents in my twenties and beyond: all reached a good age, ending with a period of decline. Nor did I have to help my own child through bereavement when small.

I’m not sure this book would be suitable for a sensitive child who had not lost a loved one, especially as Rosen is writing about the sudden death of his son, but for anyone in the early throes of grief, including young children, it’s beautiful, cathartic, and true.

As one who writes far too many words, I appreciate the power of Rosen’s brevity, enhanced by Blake’s sensitive artistry. (I’ve long loved both, and they’ve collaborated many times.)

This book is not about death itself. It simply and sensitively portrays and validates the fluctuating feelings experienced by those left behind after a death, admits to failings (taking it out on the cat, for example), and gently suggests coping mechanisms.

“Every day I try to do one thing I can be proud of. Then, when I go to bed, I think very, very hard about this one thing.”

“Every day I try to do one thing that means I have a good time. It can be anything so long as it doesn’t make anyone else unhappy.”

You think it’s ending on a happy, positive note (he loves birthdays, and “There must be candles”), and then you turn the final page: not a word, just this:

Six years and a couple of days after my father ended his life

November 2024. Mostly, I've learned to continue my life around the shock and unanswerable questions. I don't mark the anniversary, at least, not consciously. But today, a well-intentioned comment, offered in levity, triggered an instant and powerful tsunami of those feelings. I'm grateful for friends, memories, therapy, medication - and books like this (and others mentioned in this review). show less

You know, I think this is the first book I bought for Eddie new. He was just gone one at the time, and believe me, he had no shortage of books. Some were presents, the rest were picked up at assorted car boot sales and sales of work and such. But this one appealed to me because of the title, which was of the loud and raucous old campfire call-and-response poem we’d chanted in scouts, and the illustrations, which are gorgeous.

The story has four children and their Dad heading off on the show more titular bear hunt, steadily marching through the assorted obstacles which confront them (grass, river, mud, wood) with attendant sound effects. There’s a chorus repeated, a description of the obstacle and then the noisy march, all to be chanted rhythmically until finally the bear is found and the family flee back through each obstacle until they get safely back under the covers of their bed and the bear goes back to his cave.

I’ve heard more than one parent complain about Going On A Bear Hunt. ‘Oh yeah it’s great,’ they say, ‘Until you’ve done it about a hundred times.’ And, well, yes, it’s the sort of thing that can get old fast for a grown-up while remaining a perpetual favourite of the child. At first the repetitive nature of the words are mitigated by the beautiful illustrations, full of charm and personality, but even that’s got to pale for after a while.

Eddie and I certainly read Bear Hunt A LOT, and we did so loudly and quickly, especially at the end when the pace can get quite breathless. Casual visitors were often startled by the energy we put into it, but that’s what made it fun. I never really got sick of it, though, because it was never Eddie’s only book, though for a long time it was his favourite, so if you really didn’t want to read it to him, there were always plenty of others to choose from.

He’s two and a half now, and almost never asks for it, though he’ll take it if it’s offered. Lately he’s become a bit more ambivalent about the role of the bear. Now he has a slightly better grasp of stories and how they work, the realisation has dawned that the bear is the villain of the piece, and I don’t think he entirely approves. Between Goldilocks and The Three Bears, Jill Murphy’s Peace At Last and a few others, including Bear in the Big Blue House, bears, as far as he’s concerned, are the good guys. Certainly, when he gets to the last wordless double page spread of the bear trudging along the moonlit beach to his cave, head bowed, all alone, his sympathy is definitely with the bear.

‘Poor bear,’ he said when I read it to him today. ‘He lost his dinner.’ show less

Short book that tells a powerful story -- about the things families don't talk about, about grief, about the many mysteries left by the loss of so many lives in WWII. I love that Rosen links this experience directly to the current refugee crisis in Syria and to the continued genocides and displacements that are occurring. I hope he will continue to add it if he finds out more information in the future.

Advanced readers copy provided by Edelweiss.