Ogden Nash, a popular American poet, was known for his droll humor and unconventional rhymes. Most of us have heard his poetry, through we may not know him as the author, as he’s often used in everyday conversations. A great example of this is Nash’s quick verse, “Candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker,” from his book Reflections on Ice-Breaking.

Custard and Company by Ogden Nash is a collection of Nash’s poems and include “The Tale of Custard the Dragon” and “Custard the Dragon and the Wicked Knight,” two of Nash’s most beloved works. The book is also illustrated by Quentin Blake, who is best known for his collaboration with writer Roald Dahl.

Most of the poems in this book have a quality that appeals to children, both young and old, many of them mythical characters and animals as their focus. A few of the poems have children as the main characters, such as Jabez Dawes in the one quoted above, Belinda in the Custard poems and Isabel, an adventurous young girl who never screams or scurries, instead standing in the face of danger and winning.

Something surprising I found with many of these poems is that they are often clunky and terrible when read silently to yourself, but become playfully fun when read out loud, and even more so when read out loud to a child. Wonderfully fun and a book for the whole family, Custard and Company by Ogden Nash is a treasure of American Literary history.

Click for full review: http://thekoolaidmom.wordpress.com/2009/04/01/custard-and-company-by-ogden-nash/ ( )

Poetry Collection. This anthology of poems has a table of contents at the beginning. The sense of humor is a little peculiar. Poems about weather and animals abound. There is one extremely long poem about "The adventures of Isabel." She meets a bear, a witch and then cyclops. There are short and long poems. This can be used in the classroom to introduce poetry and creative writing. ( )