Ogden Nash was a rare poet. He celebrated the ordinary with delight and
curiosity: husbands and wives at work, children at play, a society in
motion. He studied popular culture with a penetrating eye and wrote
about America, its icons, habits, and affectations with humor and
levity. He struggled with comparisons to "serious" poets, those heroes
of the canon who abandoned the rhyme and meter that Nash found crucial
to his style of writing. His witty, insightful, and graceful vignettes
captured those moments in life that defy heavy-handed treatment. Nash
did not live out the stereotype of the aloof poet-recluse. In addition
to his writing, Nash pursued publishing, screenwriting, and a rigorous
lecture circuit. This self-styled poet of wide appeal appeared in
newspapers and magazines found in homes across the country, accessible
publications such as Life, The New Yorker, Cosmopolitan, Sports
Illustrated, Reader's Digest, and McCall's. At a time when children's
literature meant Winnie-the-Pooh, Nash produced verses for and about
young people that amused, educated, and more important, didn't pander or
lecture. These poems and collections, including Custard the Dragon, The
New Nutcracker Suite and Other Innocent Verses, A Boy Is a Boy, and
Girls Are Silly, were classics of the genre. Nash left behind an
invaluable body of work: charming, clever, and utterly unique.
