A re-read - or maybe my first attempt to read this cover to cover? The Opie/Sendak collaboration has been a book to dip into for adults and children alike since we got it, and a bedtime favourite for one of our children in particular right into adulthood. Drawn from the extensive scholarly work of Iona and Peter Opie, this is an excellent introduction to “nursery rhymes,” and a winner as a collection of the well known and the quirky.
Sprinkled with Sendak’s giggling, annoying, greedy, playful children, this anthology is a delight on its own made far more wonderful by the artwork. Even the notes at the back (background information and answers to riddles, &c.) has dancing children, anarchic cats, and a truck of peas and ducks) to tie the body of the text and the notes together.