Short

The Age

Saturday May 17, 2008

Reviewer, Dianne Dempsey

Short

Ed., Lili Wilkinson

Black Dog Books, $19.99

THIS MOSTLY JAUNTY YUM cha of a book consists of short stories, poems and cartoons, pitched at 10-14-year-olds and is characterised by Lili Wilkinson's injunction to contributors to keep their pieces short and pithy. The contributors include well-known writers and illustrators such as Andy Griffiths, Terry Denton, Lucy Sussex and Scot Gardner but there are many pieces from lesser known luminaries, including young people themselves.

The air of mischievousness and mayhem that pervades Short is typified by year 7 student Connor O'Brien's poem, The Killer Rabbits: "They will relish upon your eyeball/And gobble down your head/They'll eat you until you fall/They'll eat you until you're dead." Moving from rabbits to rats, Kirsty Murray's The Rat Swallower is also a lot of fun. A young girl who helps her parents run a freak show in Sideshow Alley is dismayed when their two tame rats disappear and their rat swallower has to do his best to regurgitate two huge, filthy rats with sharp yellow teeth.

As well as the macabre, several pieces such as Alicia Sometime's Bra and Mum's Advice enter the realm of hormones and growing up. And while most pieces are characterised by levity, an obvious exception is written by 13-year-old Lucy Ferguson. Her poem, The Cause of Death, expresses a collective responsibility for an endangered world in which she is yet to fully participate.

© 2008 The Age

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