A selection of the best of the hilarious free-verse poems by the
irreverent cockroach poet Archy and his alley-cat pal Mehitabel.
Don Marquis's famous fictional insect appeared in his newspaper columns
from 1916 into the 1930s, and he has delighted generations of readers
ever since. A poet in a former life, Archy was reincarnated as a bug who
expresses himself by diving headfirst onto a typewriter. His sidekick
Mehitabel is a streetwise feline who claims to have been Cleopatra in a
previous life. As E. B. White wrote in his now-classic introduction, the
Archy poems "contain cosmic reverberations along with high comedy" and
have "the jewel-like perfection of poetry."
Adorned with George Herriman's whimsical illustrations and including
White's introduction, our Pocket Poets selection--the only hardcover
Archy and Mehitabel in print--is a beautiful volume, and perfectly
sized for its tiny hero.