Poetry/Poet/Off-beat
From Playboy to Playing Poetry with L’il Boys
Arc Lighting the genius of Shel Silverstein
“When I was a kid . . . I would much rather have been a good baseball player or a hit with the girls. But I couldn’t play ball, I couldn’t dance . . . so I started to draw and write. I was lucky that I didn’t have anyone to copy, be impressed by. I had developed my own style.” — Shel Silverstein to Publishers Weekly,1975
Style he did acquire that made the world sit up and take notice. But like most mavericks who has walked the earth, it did not come easy.
Getting his most famous book The Giving Tree* published, came with its difficulties and in his own words, as told to Chicago Tribune in 1964,
“Everybody loved it, they were touched by it, they would read it and cry and say it was beautiful. But . . . one publisher said it was too short. . . .” Some thought it was too sad. Others felt that the book fell between adult and children’s literature and wouldn’t be popular.
It took Shel four years before Ursula Nordstrom, the legendary Harper & Row editor, decided to publish it.
She even let him keep the sad ending, Shel remembered, “because life, you know, has pretty sad endings. You don’t have to laugh it up even if most of my stuff is humorous.”
The book deals with a story about a boy and an apple tree, where the giving nature of the tree was thoughtlessly exploited by the boy, leading to a tragic end.
The book initially banned, before becoming a mini bible of sorts in parenting guidance, made a piercing read on how we as parents get it wrong by spoling our own kids by not teaching them empathy.
Hardly any written word (barring Dr. Seuss), has attempted to address this issue in such a creative way which has been read both by children and adults, acquiring the right meaning for the age it’s been read.
Yes.
We are talking about Sheldon Allan Silverstein(1930–1999) — the poet, song-writer, composer, illustrator, cartoonist, playwright, putting a little of himself in every thing he touched in creating time-defying literary contributions.
Uncle Shelby( his occasional pen name), was born on September 25, 1930, in Illinois,Chicago.
He took to painting at age 8, and briefly attended university before being drafted into the United States Army. He called himself a survivor, after being commissioned in Japan & Korea.
Cartoonist/Illustrator:
Shel Started drawing cartoons when in Army.
His first book Take Ten, a compilation of his military Take Ten cartoon series, was published by Pacific Stars and Stripes in 1955. An university drop-out, he later said,
his time in college was a waste and would have been better spent traveling around the world meeting people.
After returning to Chicago, Silverstein began submitting cartoons to magazines while also selling hot dogs at Chicago ballparks. His cartoons began appearing in Look, Sports Illustrated and This Week.
Mass-market paperback readers across America were introduced to Silverstein in 1956 when Take Ten was reprinted by Ballantine Books as Grab Your Socks!
In 1957, Silverstein became one of the leading cartoonists in Playboy, which sent him around the world to create an illustrated travel journal with reports from far-flung locales.
During the 1950s and 1960s, he produced 23 installments called “Shel Silverstein Visits…” as a feature for Playboy.
Employing a sketchbook format with typewriter-styled captions, he documented his own experiences at such locations as a New Jersey naturist community, the Chicago White Sox training camp, San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury, Fire Island, Mexico, London, Paris, Spain and Africa.
In a Swiss village, he drew himself complaining,
“I’ll give them 15 more minutes, and if nobody yodels, I’m going back to the hotel.”
These illustrated travel essays were collected by the publisher Fireside in Playboy’s Silverstein Around the World, published in 2007 with a foreword by Hugh Hefner and an introduction by music journalist Mitch Myers.
In a similar vein were his illustrations for John Sack’s Report from Practically Nowhere (1959), a collection of humorous travel vignettes previously appearing in Playboy and other magazines.
But his oft cited and hugely controversial work came in the form of cartoon collection, titled Now Here’s My Plan: A Book of Futilities, which was published by Simon & Schuster in 1960. Silverstein biographer Lisa Rogak wrote:
“The cartoon on the cover that provides the book’s title would turn out to be one of his most famous and often-cited cartoons. In the cartoon, two prisoners are chained to the wall of a prison cell. Both their hands and feet are shackled. One says to the other, “Now here’s my plan.”
Silverstein was both fascinated and distressed by the amount of analysis and commentary that almost immediately began to swirl around the cartoon. In Shel’s words:
“A lot of people said it was a very pessimistic cartoon, which I don’t think it is at all,” he said. “There’s a lot of hope even in a hopeless situation. They analyze it and question it. I did this cartoon because I had an idea about a funny situation about two guys.”
Silverstein’s cartoons appeared in issues of Playboy from 1957 through the mid-1970s, and one of his Playboy features was expanded into Uncle Shelby’s ABZ Book (Simon & Schuster, 1961),
his first book of new, original material for adults.
Songwriting/Composing:
I don’t have to elaborate on my choice of this video if you are familiar with this oft sung Country number by Johny Cash, written by Shel.
Silverstein studied briefly at Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University.
1.His musical output included a large catalog of songs; a number of them were hits for other artists, most notably the rock group Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show.
2.He wrote Tompall Glaser’s highest-charting solo single “Put Another Log on the Fire”
3.“25 Minutes to Go”**, sung by Johnny Cash, about a man on death row with each line counting down one minute closer
Silverstein also wrote Cash’s biggest hit, “A Boy Named Sue” as well as
“The Unicorn”, first recorded by Silverstein in 1962 but better known in its version by The Irish Rovers.
a sequel to “A Boy Named Sue” titled “Father of a Boy Named Sue”, which is less known, but he performed the song on television on The Johnny Cash Show.
4. “One’s on the Way” and “Hey Loretta” (both hits for Loretta Lynn, in 1971 and 1973 respectively), and
Lynn recorded five songs written by Silverstein. Lynn’s producer Owen Bradley once said Silversteins style of song writing was the most similar to that of Lynn’s own writing.
5.Other songs co-written by Silverstein include “The Taker” written with Kris Kristofferson and recorded by Waylon Jennings
6.He wrote the lyrics and music for most of the Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show songs on their first few albums, including “The Cover of “Rolling Stone”, “Freakin’ at the Freakers’ Ball,”
7.“Sylvia’s Mother”
8.“The Things I Didn’t Say” and
9.“Don’t Give a Dose to the One You Love Most”
The above list is not a complete discography but major ones which came home to some good hoots & cheers.
Silverstein composed original music for several films and displayed a musical versatility in these projects, playing guitar, piano, saxophone and trombone. He wrote “In the Hills of Shiloh”, a poignant song about the aftermath of the American Civil War, recorded by The New Christy Minstrels, Judy Collins, Bobby Bare, and others.
The soundtrack of the 1970 film Ned Kelly features Silverstein songs performed by Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, and others.
He was nominated for three Grammy Awards of which he won two —
1. For “A Boy named Sue” in 1970 (Best Country Song)
2. For “Where the Sidewalk Ends” in 1985 (Best Audio-book recording for children)
His song “I’m checkin’ Out” from the film Postcards from the Edge won Academy and Golden Globe Nominations.
Find a complete song catalogue of Shel Silverstein Here.
Playwright/Screenplay Writer:
Being an accomplished playwright his credits include the 1981 hit The Lady or the Tiger and The Devil and Billy Markham.
He and David Mamet each wrote a play for Lincoln Center’s production of Oh, Hell!, and they later cowrote the 1988 film Things Change.
A frequent showcase for Shel’s plays, the Ensemble Studio Theatre,New York, produced The Trio in its 1998 marathon of one-act plays.
Poetry:
Amongst all the golden hats he donned, Shel is best remembered for his collection of poetry.
1.“And now . . .a story about a very strange lion — in fact, the strangest lion I have ever met.” —
So begins Shel Silverstein’s very first children’s book, Lafcadio,the Lion Who Shot Back.
It’s funny and sad and has made readers laugh and think ever since it was published in 1963.
2.It was followed the next year by four new books. The first, The Giving Tree*, is a moving story about the love of a tree for a boy.
3.Shel returned to humor that same year with Who Wants a Cheap Rhinoceros? and A Giraffe and a Half
If you had a giraffe . . .
and he stretched another half . . .
you would have a giraffe and a half . . .
is how it starts, and the laughter builds to the most riotous ending possible.
4.The fourth book in 1964 was Uncle Shelby’s Zoo: Don’t Bump the Glump! and Other Fantasies, Shel’s only book illustrated in full color.
Shel combined his unique imagination and bold brand of humor in this collection of silly and scary creatures.
5.Shel’s second collection of poems with his own illustrations, Where the Sidewalk Ends, was published in 1974. It opens with this Invitation:
Shel invited children to dream and dare to imagine the impossible, from a hippopotamus sandwich to the longest nose in the world to eighteen flavors of ice cream to Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout who would not take the garbage out.
6.This was followed by The Missing Piece, published in 1976, and The Missing Piece Meets the Big O, published in 1981 — two companion fables that explore the concept of fulfillment.
7.With his next collection of poems and drawings, A Light in the Attic, published in 1981, Shel asked his readers to put something silly in the world, not be discouraged by the Whatifs, and turn on a light in the attic.
It is particularly significant, as he compiled this book after his 11-year old daughter died of Aneurysm.
A LIGHT IN THE ATTIC
There’s a light on in the attic.
Though the house is dark and shuttered,
I can see a flickerin’ flutter,
And I know what it’s about.
There’s a light on in the attic.
I can see it from the outside,
And I know you’re on the inside . . . lookin’ out
Shel Silverstein will perhaps always be best loved for his extraordinary books. Shel’s books are now published in more than 47 different languages.
8.The last book that was published before his death was Falling Up (1996).
Like his other books, it is filled with unforgettable characters, such as Screamin’ Millie, who screamed “so loud it made her eyebrows steam.”
There are DannyO’Dare the dancin’ bear, the Human Balloon, Headphone Harold, and a host of others.
Shel was always a believer in letting his work do the talking for him.
So come — wander through the nose garden, ride the little hoarse, and let the magic of Shel Silverstein open your eyes, tickle your mind, and show you a new world.
NEW WORLD
Upside-down trees swingin’ free,
Busses float and buildings dangle:
Now and then it’s nice to see
The world — from a different angle
9.Shel Silverstein’s legacy continued with the release of a new work, Runny Babbit.
Shel’s first posthumous publication( died in 1999 of an heart attack), conceived and completed before his death, was released in March 2005. Witty and wondrous, Runny Babbit is a poetry collection of spoonerisms, which twist the tongue and tease the mind!
Way down in the green woods
Where the animals all play,
They do things and they say things
In a different sort of way –
Instead of sayin’ “purple hat,”
They all say “hurple pat.”
Instead of sayin’ “feed the cat,”
They just say “ceed the fat.”
So if you say, “Let’s bead a rook
That’s billy as can se,”
You’re talkin’ Runny Babbit talk,
Just like mim and he.
10.Then a new collection of Shel Silverstein’s poetry, Every Thing On It, was published in 2011, comprised of 140 never-before-seen poems and drawings that Shel had completed before his death.
Say Hi-ho for the toilet troll, get tongue-tied with Stick-a-Tongue-OutSid, play a highly unusual horn, and experience the joys of growing down!
This book is filled with Shel Silverstein’s blend of humor and poignancy that bends the brain and opens the heart.
THESE BOOTS
These boots are a little too big.
It’s a fact I am forced to admit.
I am clumsy and slow,
But in ten years or so If my feet only grow,
They’ll fit.
In Conclusion:
Nothings sums up this Midas for me than this verse. The dreamer, the visionary, quirky at its best, effortlessly original, gifting the world his unique blend of inventiveness which has aged as wine as the world slowly opened up to his unique ideas and thoughts.
From a Playboy cartoonist to belting out best children’s books ever to be written in the language, he dabbled in every genre of creativity (barring dance) and turned them green, and you can’t help but be in awe of this life trajectory.
On June 25, 2019, two decades after Silverstein’s death, The New York Times Magazine listed him among hundreds of artists whose material had been destroyed in the 2008 Universal Studios fire, but it could never destroy the extra-ordinary legacy he left behind.
Some people are so ahead of their time, that time fails to evaluate their genius. And for this maverick, banned and brought back to the main fray with aplomb, this holds true like the sun in the eastern sky.
But you cannot say goodbye to a Shel Silverstein article without this time-winner from him:
When I am gone what will you do?
Who will write and draw for you?
Someone smarter — someone new?
Someone better — maybe YOU!
Reference:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shel_Silverstein
https://www.shelsilverstein.com/about-shel
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/shel-silverstein
https://www.grammy.com/artists/shel-silverstein/6471
https://theboot.com/country-songs-written-by-shel-silverstein
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Songs_written_by_Shel_Silverstein
Save a minute and enjoy this killer of a poetry by PseuPending (Seu) talking on issue we all should listen in can-you-hear-the-groans-in-your-gift-stocking.
A very interesting take on poetry by Somsubhra Banerjee here, worth a try!
Find Raine Lore highlight a rarely discussed topic, beautifully laced in poetry in october-in-the-outback.
It is always a great feeling to come back to Soul Bay. Thank you for stopping by and engaging!
And in all this, there is no reason to miss this heart-warming rendition of one of the most popular poem of Shel’s, Sick, by 5 years old Emilie.
Listen, enjoy and thank me later:)
There was a time I hated poetry.
Yes. You heard that right.
