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Jabberwalking
Juan Felipe Herrera, the first Mexican-American Poet Laureate in the USA, is sharing secrets: how to turn your wonder at the world around you into weird, wild, incandescent poetry.
Can you walk and talk at the same time? How about Jabberwalk? Can you write and draw and walk and journal all at the same time? If not, you're in luck: exuberant, blue-cheesy cilantro man Juan Felipe Herrera, Poet Laureate of the United States, is here to teach you everything he knows about being a real-life, bonified, Jabberwalking poet! Jabberwalkers write and speak for themselves and others no matter where their feet may take them -- to Jabberwalk is to be a poet on the move. And there's no stopping once you're a Jabberwalker, writing fast, fast, fast, scribble-poem-burbles-on-the-run. Scribble what you see! Scribble what you hear! It's all out there -- vamonos!
Can you walk and talk at the same time? How about Jabberwalk? Can you write and draw and walk and journal all at the same time? If not, you're in luck: exuberant, blue-cheesy cilantro man Juan Felipe Herrera, Poet Laureate of the United States, is here to teach you everything he knows about being a real-life, bonified, Jabberwalking poet! Jabberwalkers write and speak for themselves and others no matter where their feet may take them -- to Jabberwalk is to be a poet on the move. And there's no stopping once you're a Jabberwalker, writing fast, fast, fast, scribble-poem-burbles-on-the-run. Scribble what you see! Scribble what you hear! It's all out there -- vamonos!
144 pages, Paperback
Published March 13, 2018
5 people are currently reading
812 people want to read
About the author
Juan Felipe Herrera
82 books138 followersJuan Felipe Herrera is the only son of Lucha Quintana and Felipe Emilio Herrera; the three were campesinos living from crop to crop on the roads of the San Joaquín Valley, Southern California and the Salinas Valley. Herrera's experiences as the child of migrant farmers have strongly shaped his work, such as the children's book Calling the Doves, which won the Ezra Jack Keats award in 1997. He is a poet, performer, writer, cartoonist, teacher, and activist who draws from real life experiences as well as years of education to inform his work. Community and art has always been part of what has driven Herrera, beginning in the mid-seventies, when he was director of the Centro Cultural de la Raza, an occupied water tank in Balboa Park converted into an arts space for the community.
Herrera’s publications include fourteen collections of poetry, prose, short stories, young adult novels and picture books for children in the last decade with twenty-one books in total.
Herrera’s publications include fourteen collections of poetry, prose, short stories, young adult novels and picture books for children in the last decade with twenty-one books in total.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 63 reviews
April 3, 2018
It's difficult picking a rating for something where you enjoy the message and meaning of a work (don't hold back creatively, embrace your voice, embrace your weird), but you don't necessarily dig the way it's presented. That's where I'm at with Jabberwalking. I'm not a big fan of the weird crazy nonsense poetry here, but I appreciate the message and meaning.
August 29, 2018
Not too long ago I taught a six-week summer creative writing course for teens. Now I’ve never taught creative writing before. Truth be told, I had no idea where to start. So, like any good librarian, I hit the books. My idea was to take a different book each week and use it as a creative writing guide for the kids. And since these were teens we were talking about, I mixed up the reading levels on the guides. As a result they took deep dives into The Creativity Project, Writing Radar, Spilling Ink, Bird by Bird, On Writing, and The Secrets of Story. Now on the first day I asked the kids what they liked to write. I got some fantasy, some realism, some humor, and more than one kid said poetry. Poetry. Huh. Well that hadn’t really occurred to me, but sure, that’s creative writing all right. Only, instructional poetry books, besides being few and far between for this age level, weren’t really on my pre-written recommended reading list so I sort of skipped over that aspect of writing. I’m telling you this because of the foot-shaped dent in my lower left shin where I’ve been kicking myself ever since. If I’d been on top of my game I would have realized, the moment those young people said “poetry”, that I was in the unique position of having already seen, what I think may be safely called, the strangest, bravest, weirdest, mind-trip of an instructional poetry guide I’ve ever seen in my whole friggin’ life. Look, if you want a poetry guide that’s going to tell you how many syllables are in a haiku and what a “stanza” is, look elsewhere. If, however, you want an instructional poetry book that feels like what happens when a zine consumes a human from the inside like a xenomorph in Alien and releases an explosion of heat and heart and light and life, there’s really only one choice out there. And it’s from a former National Poet Laureate too.
This is the part of the review where I describe the book. This is the part of the review where I put on my Very Serious Writing Fingers and type out a Very Serious Description that uses lots of long words but does not, no matter how much I want it to, copy the publisher’s blurb. Normally, this is the part of the review I write last because it’s the easiest part. Today it’s the hardest. I’m going to have to try to encapsulate something that doesn’t really want to be encapsulated. So . . . let’s try this. Imagine you were looking at a painting that made you feel inexplicably melancholy. Someone walks up to you and asks how you’re feeling. You tell them, but looking at the same art they can’t feel what you feel. It’s a personal moment for you and just you. Poetry is the same way, but with words, and Juan Felipe Herrera wants to give kids and teens the tools to make it something that frees them in some way. But he also wants to give them some advice on the matter. The solution, as he sees it, is to weave his own story, about going to Washington D.C. and his youth with odd fictional moments and advice given in as eclectic a style possible, telling kids to get up, get moving, get writing, get reading, get to making something of their own. The end result is messy and big and exactly what you need if you want to hotwire a kid’s gray matter into action.
So poetry for kids and teens is hot right now. Don’t ask me why. I have a couple theories but nothing too concrete. It could be that it has something to do with Kwame Alexander’s unrelenting promotion of the form. It could be that poetry is the voice of rebellion and right now we need a little more rebellion in our lives. It could be a confluence of some kind of cosmic convergence in the heavens for all I know. Whatever it is, we may be approaching some kind of a poetry renaissance in children’s literature these days because this book blows to high heaven those preconceived notions of what constitutes “poetry” today. A lot of kids have only ever encountered poetry in its various rigid forms. This is good. You can’t break the rules until you know the rules, after all, so I imagine that encountering Jabberwalking for the first time will be a freeing process for them. If they're capable and willing to try to pick up what it's laying down, of course.
When I select a book for kids and decide whether or not to read it, I have this weird process where I try to dive in without any preconceptions. I avoid bookflaps and reviews (as much as possible) and blurbs. Now in my mind, this means that I’m approaching the book fresh, but what actually happens is that my brain, lacking for any kind of tangible or concrete information, starts speculating wildly about what the book might be about. In the case of this book I sort of flipped through the pages, saw it had starred reviews, and came to the not wholly ridiculous assumption that it was some sort of large format poetry book. Not an unreasonable conclusion to draw. Imagine my confusion then when I started to read. I think my thoughts went in the order of, “Wait, is this nonfiction? A memoir? No, it’s . . . is it poetry? No, it’s doing something else. What is it doing?!?” What it’s doing is instructing through action. Show don’t tell, they say, but if you can pull off both at the same time, why not try it? So it was that after an inordinately long amount of time I finally figured out that this was a poetry writing guide, after a fashion. But as I mentioned, I’m used to staid, serious, rote writing guides that are meant to guide kids to write fiction or nonfiction. Poetry, as it turns out, is a whole other kettle of fish.
What Mr. Herrera is doing here . . . okay, I had to cheat to find the right way to describe it. Let’s go to the professionals, shall we? Horn Book said the messiness of the text, “send[s] the message of encouraging young writers to let their words flow unstopped by convention or constraint, and to allow themselves to jump around and go on tangents and not worry about it.” Kirkus said the, “metafictive exploration of the poetic process dips in and out of imagined reality as easily as the Cheshire Cat winks in and out of sight.” PW said it shows how, “riotous verbal exuberance births poetry.” And all the while you’re watching as the poet talks about his own life and then leaps to fictional parts involving a Jabber Girl named Zandunga García from Bunion Junction, then to instructions for writers and around and around again. It’s dizzying and freeing all at the same time. He’s basically just giving readers permission to do whatever they want on the page. For a lot of them, it’ll be the first time anyone’s ever even suggested that such a thing could be done.
Trying to compare this book to any other book out there is a bit difficult. I think it’s fairly safe to say that it’s literally unlike any book published with kids in teens in mind in America before (from a major publisher anyway). The closest approximation I’m able to come up with is maybe Shel Silverstein meets Ulysses. The Ulysses part of that is pretty self-explanatory, what with the stream of consciousness that isn’t actually a stream of consciousness. The Silverstein has more to do with the tone (Uncle Shelby would definitely have approved of Jabberwalking) and the art. And the art isn’t something that you might think much about but as far as I can tell (and I have scoured the publication page of this puppy until there wasn’t a word left unscathed) Mr. Herrera did the art himself. Now how about that! A Poet Laureate that is also someone with a wacky urge to doodle outside his own margins.
Of course nobody’s quite sure what age to market this to. The publisher (Candlewick) was selling it pretty clearly for kids in the 9-12 year old age. Kirkus Reviews, however, said 12-16, no bones about it. Publishers Weekly said 10 and up, School Library Journal said 7th grade and up and frankly nobody agrees on nuthin’. Of these, I’m going to side with PW on this one. While it is true that teens might have more patience sticking with Herrera as he jumps, leaps, and bellyflops from one idea to another, do you remember that writing course I gave for teens? Well as any good librarian will tell you, do any kind of program for older kids and you’ll get younger ones just clamoring to take part. At least half my classes were filled with “teenagers” ← note the quotation marks. These kids were smart as whips, creative as all get out, and they would totally eat up what this book is dishing out. So as far as I’m concerned this is a book for anybody with a yen to give it the old college try.
Because at its heart, Herrera is putting his mouth where his money is. He’s doing everything in his power to show the messiness of poetry in its roughest forms. To show how poetry is something raw and spontaneous and as much a feeling as a form. He’s actually making as clear as anyone can why people love poetry. The end result is that this book isn’t going to be for everyone. You’re going to get a fair number of kids (maybe those haiku lovers) that get three pages in and then call it “weird” and walk away. But for every five or ten or maybe even twenty kids that turn away, there’s going to be this one that can’t resist it. That colorful splatter on the cover. The heft and size of it, like even the publisher understood that the words on show here needed something substantial for maximum importance. And when the man writing this book tells you that “Your burbles are going to become a Seismic & Crazy Epic Poem!” that kid is going to believe what he says. Maybe write more poetry. Maybe write better poetry. Maybe start walking and observing and drawing on the parts of their lives that they never thought they could write about. And maybe something inside this book is going to stick with them for a long long time. Mr. Herrera could have written a normal instructional book for young writers. Instead he decided to fill his readers’ “burrito head[s] full of incandescent Sparkles” with fire and frenzy and risk and flavor. It doesn’t all work. Writing doesn’t. But if you seriously have a kid that wants to write poetry and isn’t afraid to take the advice of a man that can write a phrase like “crazy, fuzzy, putrid blue-cheesy planet-frijol-bean” with a straight face, there’s nothing else you can hand them BUT this. And that’s the Jabberwalking truth of the matter.
For ages 10 and up.
This is the part of the review where I describe the book. This is the part of the review where I put on my Very Serious Writing Fingers and type out a Very Serious Description that uses lots of long words but does not, no matter how much I want it to, copy the publisher’s blurb. Normally, this is the part of the review I write last because it’s the easiest part. Today it’s the hardest. I’m going to have to try to encapsulate something that doesn’t really want to be encapsulated. So . . . let’s try this. Imagine you were looking at a painting that made you feel inexplicably melancholy. Someone walks up to you and asks how you’re feeling. You tell them, but looking at the same art they can’t feel what you feel. It’s a personal moment for you and just you. Poetry is the same way, but with words, and Juan Felipe Herrera wants to give kids and teens the tools to make it something that frees them in some way. But he also wants to give them some advice on the matter. The solution, as he sees it, is to weave his own story, about going to Washington D.C. and his youth with odd fictional moments and advice given in as eclectic a style possible, telling kids to get up, get moving, get writing, get reading, get to making something of their own. The end result is messy and big and exactly what you need if you want to hotwire a kid’s gray matter into action.
So poetry for kids and teens is hot right now. Don’t ask me why. I have a couple theories but nothing too concrete. It could be that it has something to do with Kwame Alexander’s unrelenting promotion of the form. It could be that poetry is the voice of rebellion and right now we need a little more rebellion in our lives. It could be a confluence of some kind of cosmic convergence in the heavens for all I know. Whatever it is, we may be approaching some kind of a poetry renaissance in children’s literature these days because this book blows to high heaven those preconceived notions of what constitutes “poetry” today. A lot of kids have only ever encountered poetry in its various rigid forms. This is good. You can’t break the rules until you know the rules, after all, so I imagine that encountering Jabberwalking for the first time will be a freeing process for them. If they're capable and willing to try to pick up what it's laying down, of course.
When I select a book for kids and decide whether or not to read it, I have this weird process where I try to dive in without any preconceptions. I avoid bookflaps and reviews (as much as possible) and blurbs. Now in my mind, this means that I’m approaching the book fresh, but what actually happens is that my brain, lacking for any kind of tangible or concrete information, starts speculating wildly about what the book might be about. In the case of this book I sort of flipped through the pages, saw it had starred reviews, and came to the not wholly ridiculous assumption that it was some sort of large format poetry book. Not an unreasonable conclusion to draw. Imagine my confusion then when I started to read. I think my thoughts went in the order of, “Wait, is this nonfiction? A memoir? No, it’s . . . is it poetry? No, it’s doing something else. What is it doing?!?” What it’s doing is instructing through action. Show don’t tell, they say, but if you can pull off both at the same time, why not try it? So it was that after an inordinately long amount of time I finally figured out that this was a poetry writing guide, after a fashion. But as I mentioned, I’m used to staid, serious, rote writing guides that are meant to guide kids to write fiction or nonfiction. Poetry, as it turns out, is a whole other kettle of fish.
What Mr. Herrera is doing here . . . okay, I had to cheat to find the right way to describe it. Let’s go to the professionals, shall we? Horn Book said the messiness of the text, “send[s] the message of encouraging young writers to let their words flow unstopped by convention or constraint, and to allow themselves to jump around and go on tangents and not worry about it.” Kirkus said the, “metafictive exploration of the poetic process dips in and out of imagined reality as easily as the Cheshire Cat winks in and out of sight.” PW said it shows how, “riotous verbal exuberance births poetry.” And all the while you’re watching as the poet talks about his own life and then leaps to fictional parts involving a Jabber Girl named Zandunga García from Bunion Junction, then to instructions for writers and around and around again. It’s dizzying and freeing all at the same time. He’s basically just giving readers permission to do whatever they want on the page. For a lot of them, it’ll be the first time anyone’s ever even suggested that such a thing could be done.
Trying to compare this book to any other book out there is a bit difficult. I think it’s fairly safe to say that it’s literally unlike any book published with kids in teens in mind in America before (from a major publisher anyway). The closest approximation I’m able to come up with is maybe Shel Silverstein meets Ulysses. The Ulysses part of that is pretty self-explanatory, what with the stream of consciousness that isn’t actually a stream of consciousness. The Silverstein has more to do with the tone (Uncle Shelby would definitely have approved of Jabberwalking) and the art. And the art isn’t something that you might think much about but as far as I can tell (and I have scoured the publication page of this puppy until there wasn’t a word left unscathed) Mr. Herrera did the art himself. Now how about that! A Poet Laureate that is also someone with a wacky urge to doodle outside his own margins.
Of course nobody’s quite sure what age to market this to. The publisher (Candlewick) was selling it pretty clearly for kids in the 9-12 year old age. Kirkus Reviews, however, said 12-16, no bones about it. Publishers Weekly said 10 and up, School Library Journal said 7th grade and up and frankly nobody agrees on nuthin’. Of these, I’m going to side with PW on this one. While it is true that teens might have more patience sticking with Herrera as he jumps, leaps, and bellyflops from one idea to another, do you remember that writing course I gave for teens? Well as any good librarian will tell you, do any kind of program for older kids and you’ll get younger ones just clamoring to take part. At least half my classes were filled with “teenagers” ← note the quotation marks. These kids were smart as whips, creative as all get out, and they would totally eat up what this book is dishing out. So as far as I’m concerned this is a book for anybody with a yen to give it the old college try.
Because at its heart, Herrera is putting his mouth where his money is. He’s doing everything in his power to show the messiness of poetry in its roughest forms. To show how poetry is something raw and spontaneous and as much a feeling as a form. He’s actually making as clear as anyone can why people love poetry. The end result is that this book isn’t going to be for everyone. You’re going to get a fair number of kids (maybe those haiku lovers) that get three pages in and then call it “weird” and walk away. But for every five or ten or maybe even twenty kids that turn away, there’s going to be this one that can’t resist it. That colorful splatter on the cover. The heft and size of it, like even the publisher understood that the words on show here needed something substantial for maximum importance. And when the man writing this book tells you that “Your burbles are going to become a Seismic & Crazy Epic Poem!” that kid is going to believe what he says. Maybe write more poetry. Maybe write better poetry. Maybe start walking and observing and drawing on the parts of their lives that they never thought they could write about. And maybe something inside this book is going to stick with them for a long long time. Mr. Herrera could have written a normal instructional book for young writers. Instead he decided to fill his readers’ “burrito head[s] full of incandescent Sparkles” with fire and frenzy and risk and flavor. It doesn’t all work. Writing doesn’t. But if you seriously have a kid that wants to write poetry and isn’t afraid to take the advice of a man that can write a phrase like “crazy, fuzzy, putrid blue-cheesy planet-frijol-bean” with a straight face, there’s nothing else you can hand them BUT this. And that’s the Jabberwalking truth of the matter.
For ages 10 and up.
December 16, 2018
I had a hard time finishing this one. I like the concept and think there are some good suggestions for the writing process in it. I also liked the author’s “notebook” portions where he shares a little bit about his & his family’s history in asides, and the few, brief, more structured poetry moments were good. HOWEVER, the “story” was very jarring & ridiculous, and he used the descriptors sweaty, puffy, and blue-cheesy so many times that I wanted to scream...or turn it into a drinking game. I was also a bit offended by the “Jabber Girl Blog” part, since his depiction of the girl felt rather sexist. Honestly, I think if I was to give this to the kids at my library, they would either not finish it or constantly make fun of its absurdity, losing the point it was trying to make.
October 21, 2017
This book makes you want to let go of conventions and fear and write, write, write! Woven in is his story, the story of growing up in a family of migrant farm workers who were also musicians and word lovers, and his amazement that he became US Poet Laureate.
December 31, 2017
If you like poetry and nonsense words then you will love Jabberwalking. Part poetry, part instructional guide, all fun.
March 30, 2019
Jabber-Walking is written by Juan Felipe Herrera who is was the Poet Laureate of the United States in 2015-2017. This collection of poems includes information and tips on how to Jabber-Walk or in other words be a poet. Jabber-Walking contains poems that seem non sensical but turn into something more. This is a true Ode to creativity, imagination, and poetry. It highlights and encourages the messiness that comes with creativity and expression. Because of this I think it would be a great text to use to show a growth mindset and trying things out. Often times students rely on teachers to tell them what to do or they are too focused on the grade they will receive that they do not try new ideas when it comes to creative projects. I think this text does a great job of cultivating creativity. I would recommend this text for high school students mostly but I do think some middle schoolers, who demonstrate the creativity and eccentric thinking represented in the text, will enjoy it as well.
December 19, 2018
I hope junior high students understood and found the process useful. It looked fun but I could not get into the swing of it. It has a delightful layout and talks about writing -- both good. It makes no mention of electronic media and I feel certain that was a deliberate action that took much determination.
Read
October 20, 2017Candlewick described this book at Herrera's advice to young poets. Great add-on for kids who got hooked through Kwame Alexander.
April 16, 2018
Lewis Carroll’s inspiration is undeniable in this book which is part story, part handbook, and packed with nonsensical words and phrases.
September 12, 2020
This was a lot of fun. Honestly, for me it was a five star book for the first three quarters of it. All about letting go of your voice and writing whatever and letting it all go and very kid friendly. In the end...it kinda goes off the rails a bit. For me, it was the turning of the whole thing into fictional space travel messiness...but I think a lot of kids will love that. For them, the bit of the 1960s nostalgia is going to be confusing if not annoying.
As you can probably tell, this book is really hard to explain. But it's also short and fairly accessible...if you know a creative kid I wouldn't worry too much about *what* it is, I'd just stick it in their hands and see what they do with it.
As for me as the adult reader...it made me want to read more by him.
As you can probably tell, this book is really hard to explain. But it's also short and fairly accessible...if you know a creative kid I wouldn't worry too much about *what* it is, I'd just stick it in their hands and see what they do with it.
As for me as the adult reader...it made me want to read more by him.
September 4, 2021
Beautiful cover for this frenetic, blue-cheesy book.
There's a kind of blackout poetry encouraged, although the process lacks some clarity.
The second half falls into a bizarre story and loses some of the energy of the first half. Fresno-York feels pejorative, and we never made it to D.C. I don't think. Or maybe so: https://www.loc.gov/item/webcast-8317/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW8xl...
p. 72 To Be a Jabber Walker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TNqz...
p. 98 "her DNA has squirrel pictures in it"
p. 128 I noticed that writing was like everything else--being with people, in front of everyone in as many ways as possible, jabberwalking with the world on the spinning planet. Jabberwalking was made of--kindness, I discovered.
There's a kind of blackout poetry encouraged, although the process lacks some clarity.
The second half falls into a bizarre story and loses some of the energy of the first half. Fresno-York feels pejorative, and we never made it to D.C. I don't think. Or maybe so: https://www.loc.gov/item/webcast-8317/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW8xl...
p. 72 To Be a Jabber Walker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TNqz...
p. 98 "her DNA has squirrel pictures in it"
p. 128 I noticed that writing was like everything else--being with people, in front of everyone in as many ways as possible, jabberwalking with the world on the spinning planet. Jabberwalking was made of--kindness, I discovered.
October 8, 2023
*read this for my graduate program*
LOVED the message of this book. Writing is for everyone because writing can be whatever we want it to be. It can be scribbles, lists, notes and meditative. However, if I ever read the words "blue-cheesy" I WILL FOREVER think of this book. I don't understand why the author kept repeating himself (yes, I know it was poetry, but really??) it was unnecessary.
I might not be the audience for this book as it did feel a bit childish in the way the reader was addressed and it was longer than it needed to be.
In essence, read it if you are an educator or if you question the way in which writing is taught and judged.
LOVED the message of this book. Writing is for everyone because writing can be whatever we want it to be. It can be scribbles, lists, notes and meditative. However, if I ever read the words "blue-cheesy" I WILL FOREVER think of this book. I don't understand why the author kept repeating himself (yes, I know it was poetry, but really??) it was unnecessary.
I might not be the audience for this book as it did feel a bit childish in the way the reader was addressed and it was longer than it needed to be.
In essence, read it if you are an educator or if you question the way in which writing is taught and judged.
November 4, 2023
This past summer I participated in a 3-week intensive writing workshop for teachers. During that time, I decided I wanted to experiment more with poetry. One of my favorite activities from the workshop was a Walk and Write. If you want to know what a Walk and Write is about, read this book.
Obviously inspired by Lewis Carroll, Juan Felipe Herrera writes a charming book that encourages readers to be brave, get out and explore your world, and write what you see, what you hear, and what you feel.
I absolutely love the blend on English, Spanish, and nonsense words Herrera uses. I can't wait to share this book with other teachers at my school.
Obviously inspired by Lewis Carroll, Juan Felipe Herrera writes a charming book that encourages readers to be brave, get out and explore your world, and write what you see, what you hear, and what you feel.
I absolutely love the blend on English, Spanish, and nonsense words Herrera uses. I can't wait to share this book with other teachers at my school.
July 18, 2022
This was a interesting book to read, in some ways it reminded me of Dr. Seuss. But, it was a new way of writing style that my son and I learned about. I guess some people would love it but, I really didn't take to it...like Picasso's art. Everyone sees and hears things differently, and they take away what they want from art, literature, and music.
August 21, 2020
Poetry is somewhat 'outside my box'....& this is really some unusual poetry! Altho it seemed like a mess, there really was a point to the whole thing! An unusual talent, art, example here.......but it was ok, I guess. I did get the point he was making....I think?!
April 11, 2021
Very fun poetry book with pictures and free verse. Definitely inspired me to bring a notebook when I go for walks. Ending reminded me of Sirens of Titan by Vonnegut because of the time and space anomalies.
May 23, 2022
I wanted to like this book so much more than I did. I have the first verse of the poem Jabberwocky tattooed on my body. This felt toooooo hurried. Portions of it, including the overall message, were lovely. In other times it felt like the book just wanted you to be done with it and move on.
January 6, 2020
Amazing! Inspiring and creative
December 7, 2020
Silly and over the top, listen to the audio version for accessible poetry from a poet laureate
January 1, 2021
What??
January 13, 2023
A bit too manic and repetitive for me.
March 20, 2018
This is a gem; a (jabber)wacky, burble-y one, yes, but still a incandescent, shimmering gem it is. As you jabber-turn the pages (or click in my case) of this book, words of all kinds – nouns, verbs, brilliant adjectives and adverbs, and more – zip-zap-zoom, swish-flash-splash right at you, and sometimes amble at a pace you can relate to, and my tip – take a breath at those points, you will need it as you free fall into love with jabberwalking poetry!
Starting off with words from Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky, this book talks about finding poetry everywhere, in everything you see, do, hear, feel – in short – in using all your senses and scribbling down (literally) the words that pop out of your brain and convert them into poetry; and you can do it – on the move, wherever, whenever, scribble down your thoughts (even if and especially when they don’t make sense!) – and then use those treasured scribbles, polish them down to precious poetry!Herrera’s words dance across the pages, they whisper, scream, jump up and down (most likely with joy!), move between planets, play with doodles and drawings and scribbles, and share space with stories from his life of his journey to becoming who he is today, and draw you in to simply – CREATE!
So, come on, vamanos, let us all go do some jabberwalking!! Not yet, you say? You want to read the book first? Sure, in that case, see you all later, as for me, I am going to do me some jabber-walking-dancing :)My Note: This is a great book for parents and educators to encourage creative writing in all its forms! So definitely a great gift for those teachers you know and for parents and kids who love to explore the art of writing!
You can watch a trailer of the book by Herrerra himself here.
Rating: A+
Reading Level: Ages 8 – 12 (and all those who love wacky poetry, creativity, and words that zip zap and zoom all over)
Reread Level: 4.5/5
Disclaimer: Thank you to NetGalley for sending me an advanced digital review copy of Jabberwalking (and through this, helping me discover this wonderful gifted poet laureate)
Starting off with words from Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky, this book talks about finding poetry everywhere, in everything you see, do, hear, feel – in short – in using all your senses and scribbling down (literally) the words that pop out of your brain and convert them into poetry; and you can do it – on the move, wherever, whenever, scribble down your thoughts (even if and especially when they don’t make sense!) – and then use those treasured scribbles, polish them down to precious poetry!Herrera’s words dance across the pages, they whisper, scream, jump up and down (most likely with joy!), move between planets, play with doodles and drawings and scribbles, and share space with stories from his life of his journey to becoming who he is today, and draw you in to simply – CREATE!
So, come on, vamanos, let us all go do some jabberwalking!! Not yet, you say? You want to read the book first? Sure, in that case, see you all later, as for me, I am going to do me some jabber-walking-dancing :)My Note: This is a great book for parents and educators to encourage creative writing in all its forms! So definitely a great gift for those teachers you know and for parents and kids who love to explore the art of writing!
You can watch a trailer of the book by Herrerra himself here.
Rating: A+
Reading Level: Ages 8 – 12 (and all those who love wacky poetry, creativity, and words that zip zap and zoom all over)
Reread Level: 4.5/5
Disclaimer: Thank you to NetGalley for sending me an advanced digital review copy of Jabberwalking (and through this, helping me discover this wonderful gifted poet laureate)
December 23, 2018
This is the perfect book to pair with Sydell Rosenberg's H is for Haiku, because what is jabberwalking other than writing, drawing, journaling and walking at the same time as you "burble" what you see around you: "Scribble what you see/Scribble what you hear/ Scribble out the electric Jabber worms crawling out of you head & eyes/Scribble what that dude skating is hollering/Scribble everything that goes on in the cafeteria/Scribble what all the teachers say in the halls... According to Herrera, if we follow this method, we can all be poets, even the least poetic among us. Inspired by Lewis Carroll's poem "Jabberwocky," Herrera includes some of the words that Carroll made up for his work, and gives them new meaning, for example, a burble = a poem. Herrera divides this book into 15 instructional chapters, the content of which zigs and zags over the pages, accompanied by his drawings, and though seeming to be as nonsensical as Carroll's poem at first, they actually provide the reader with inspiration and instruction. My Kiddo came home for the holidays before heading off the China again, and announced that she was now experimenting with writing poetry. So, I gave Jabberwalking to her to see what she thought about it. Well, long story short, she loved it and won't give it back, she says she has put on her "Jabber Booots" and plans to jabberwalk in China. Need I say more about this unique book?
June 30, 2018
From the first Mexican-American Poet Laureate of the United States comes this call to become a person who can write and walk at the same time. It’s a book that demands that you record your thoughts, messy and wild and raw. That you use documents to find words, that you draw ideas while on airplanes, that you walk a lot, think a lot, write a lot. That you embrace the voice that is inside you and create. Whatever that creation looks like in all of its “fuzzy, puffy, blue-cheesy, incandescent, brave Jabber!”
Looking for a straight-forward and rule based book on being a writer or creative person? This is not the book you are looking for! Instead this is a book that shows raw creativity, using inspiration from Lewis Carroll and the Jabberwocky, this is a book filled with emotion, encouragement, and acceptance about the way that our human brains work best when creating. It invites readers into a playful world where words are toys, content is loose, and ideas flow freely.
The writing here could initially be seen as too loose and raw. But as you read more and more of the book there is a gorgeous continuum of content throughout the chapters. Soon blue-cheesy starts to make sense and jabberwalking is all you want to do for awhile to see what comes out of your brain too.
Inspiring and incredibly joyous, this book about writing is entirely unexpected. Appropriate for ages 9-12.
Looking for a straight-forward and rule based book on being a writer or creative person? This is not the book you are looking for! Instead this is a book that shows raw creativity, using inspiration from Lewis Carroll and the Jabberwocky, this is a book filled with emotion, encouragement, and acceptance about the way that our human brains work best when creating. It invites readers into a playful world where words are toys, content is loose, and ideas flow freely.
The writing here could initially be seen as too loose and raw. But as you read more and more of the book there is a gorgeous continuum of content throughout the chapters. Soon blue-cheesy starts to make sense and jabberwalking is all you want to do for awhile to see what comes out of your brain too.
Inspiring and incredibly joyous, this book about writing is entirely unexpected. Appropriate for ages 9-12.
January 30, 2018
JABBERWALKING opens your eyes to a new way of creating poetry. The trick is to scribble all of your nonsense words down while walking fast. The can be completely random and beautiful at the same time. The author teaches that you shouldn't hold back and you never know what masterpiece you can create if you don't try.
The author wants you to use all of your senses while walking fast. Write what you here and write what you see. This book is the key to learn how to become a Jabber-Walking expert.
JABBERWALKING sparks your imagination while getting you out of the house and on the move.
This book was a little hectic, but it is quick to catch your attention. This may just be the way to open up the new generation's eyes to the beauty that poetry can be. I also absolutely love the colorful cover.
Final Verdict: I would recommend this to those who have a big imagination and who want to learn how to write poetry. I would also recommend it to encourage getting out of the house and becoming more active.
The author wants you to use all of your senses while walking fast. Write what you here and write what you see. This book is the key to learn how to become a Jabber-Walking expert.
JABBERWALKING sparks your imagination while getting you out of the house and on the move.
This book was a little hectic, but it is quick to catch your attention. This may just be the way to open up the new generation's eyes to the beauty that poetry can be. I also absolutely love the colorful cover.
Final Verdict: I would recommend this to those who have a big imagination and who want to learn how to write poetry. I would also recommend it to encourage getting out of the house and becoming more active.
March 19, 2018
This was a fun and quirky book on creativity and how to make something out of seemingly nothing. I really like this approach of taking the minds ramblings and polishing them into diamonds. Even though this is short and written in a fast-paced wacky kind of way, there are some really good lessons in the text about listening, expressing and refining one's ideas, thoughts and writing. I also think the idea of Jabberwalking would be fabulous when one is faced with writer's block as I can see how it would shift the focus of the mind away from the problem and allow a new door for the solution to walk through. I would recommend this book to all creative people, especially those who are disciples of the Artists way.
October 18, 2018
What fun! I'm so glad my wide awake in the middle of the night brain chose this one from the 2015-2017 Poet Laureate of the United States.
When you open this book you should expect to be taken by the hand and pulled quickly into a world of fast paced, write it as you think it, poetry. The coolest part, cooler than learning about Herrera throughout the book (which was pretty darn cool) is that he urges you to join in on the fun! As a teacher I felt the ideas literally buzzing around my head. How I would read particular sections, where the students would write, how the experience would shake off some of the fear of making writing perfect. Mostly poetry, autobiographical pages here and there, a dash of odd, and a sprinkle of wild. Really, what are you waiting for?
When you open this book you should expect to be taken by the hand and pulled quickly into a world of fast paced, write it as you think it, poetry. The coolest part, cooler than learning about Herrera throughout the book (which was pretty darn cool) is that he urges you to join in on the fun! As a teacher I felt the ideas literally buzzing around my head. How I would read particular sections, where the students would write, how the experience would shake off some of the fear of making writing perfect. Mostly poetry, autobiographical pages here and there, a dash of odd, and a sprinkle of wild. Really, what are you waiting for?
May 14, 2018
Language – G (0 swears, 0 “f”), Mature Content – G; Violence – G; Herrera talks directly to readers in this book of jabberwalking poems. As he talks with readers, Herrera also teaches his readers how to jabberwalk and write poems like he does. Hurry! You’ll get left behind if you can’t keep up.
The poems and narrative told through those poems are very disjointed and confusing. I didn’t understand what was going on in the first couple of chapters, then I thought I understood what was going on, and then I was lost again as Herrera continued with his half-baked ideas. If I learned anything from this book it’s that anyone can write a book.
Reviewed for https://kissthebook.blogspot.com/
The poems and narrative told through those poems are very disjointed and confusing. I didn’t understand what was going on in the first couple of chapters, then I thought I understood what was going on, and then I was lost again as Herrera continued with his half-baked ideas. If I learned anything from this book it’s that anyone can write a book.
Reviewed for https://kissthebook.blogspot.com/
April 14, 2018
Study the intentional explosion of bright cover-art color, with the whimsical addition of a man walking a dog. Add in what you already know of Lewis Carroll's nonsensical poem Jabberwocky. Stay out of the deep end of the Meanings ocean, and instead, let the lyrical text give you a fresh insight simply into writing poetry. Read the pages aloud! As with most poetry, these words and their rhythm should be heard rather than read silently. This, this is fun.
xx-dnf-skim-reference
April 26, 2019Love that it's creative and dramatic. Hyper kids may feel it speaks to them. Don't love that the campesinos' libraries will not be able to afford it (it's a coffee-table size book, heavy paper, not really much text, no color but almost all lettering handwritten... iow totally full of itself). Am flabbergasted at the idea that it could be an audiobook... the illustrations are plentiful and integral.
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