1. Bibliography
Florian, Douglas. 2012. Shiver Me Timbers! Illustrated by Robert Neubecker. New York: Beach Lane Books. ISBN 9781442413214
2. Plot Summary
In this topical poetry book for children, the individual poems are about the life of pirates with illustrations that bring to life the comical side of these crazy group of scallywags.
3. Critical Analysis
All of the poems in this funny poetry book about pirates have some kind of rhyme scheme. Florian is particularly fond of rhyming couplets such as in "A Pirate's Life":
A pirate's life is topsy-turvy,
Full of strife, and rife with scurvy.
He also commonly uses abab and abcb rhyme schemes. The effect of these rhyming poems is that they create a musical quality to the poems and reinforce the idea that these are children's poems. Additionally, Florian uses iambic meter throughout most of the poems. For instance, he uses alternating iambic tetrameter and iambic trimeter in "Pirate Punishment":
They put me in an iron cage,
Then made me walk the plank.
The sing-song, musical feel of the poems is enhanced through the meter of each line. The language is careful and exact. Florian uses the dialect of pirates such as "thar she blows" and "me scraggly beard." The subject of each poem is about pirate life, and Florian has done a great job of creating humor by poking fun at the life of a storybook pirate. For instance, in "Pirates' Meal," Florian lists the types of fish that pirates eat each day of the week. At the end, the narrator remarks, "If we have fish for one more day / Methinks that I will puke." Other poems such as "Me, Pirate" and "Pirate Flags" contain laughable humor as well. Because of the humorous and lighthearted tone of the poems, the reader can laugh and enjoy the poems about these non-threatening, stereotypical pirates of the sea.
The illustrations by Robert Neubecker contain bold colors and thick black lines which make them very child-like and chunky, but they effectively create a comical tone towards the pirates and their zany livelihood. Children will laugh out loud at the funny details found within each illustration. For instance, in "Me, Pirate" the pirate has bows in his beard and a round hole in his front tooth. Overall, the illustrations creatively bring the poet's words to life.
4. Review Excerpts
Kirkus Reviews, starred review: "It’s not a stretch to say that if Shel Silverstein himself were to have dabbled in the piratical he could not have come up with a better selection of scurvy doggerel than the delicious verses found here.”
School Library Journal starred review: “From the smiling, rollicking kids on the cover laying claim to a beach full of treasure to the shipload of fierce, sneering, plundering, cutlass-waving, face-making buccaneers, boastful of their scurrilous behavior, these pirates are a motley group."
Horn Book review: “Florian provides young pirate lovers with a profusion of arrrghs and ahoy mateys, enough to keep their piratephilia alive for a long time."
5. Connection
Shiver Me Timbers! is a great book for a read-aloud for pure enjoyment purposes. Teachers and librarians might want to do a poet study of Douglas Florian with students or use his poetry to teach and practice rhythm and rhyme.
Other books by Douglas Florian:
Florian, Douglas. Comets, Stars, the Moon, and Mars. ISBN 0152053727
Florian, Douglas. Dinothesaurus. ISBN 1416979786
Florian, Douglas. Poetrees. ISBN 1416986723
For more illustrated books by Robert Neubecker:
Lithgow, John. I Got Two Dogs. Illustrated by Robert Neubecker. ISBN 1416958819
Neubecker, Robert. Courage of the Blue Boy. Illustrated by Robert Neubecker. ISBN 1582461821
Neubecker, Robert. Wow! Ocean! Illustrated by Robert Neubecker. ISBN 1423131134
Other books about pirates:
Duddle, Jonny. The Pirate Cruncher. Illustrated by Jonny Duddle. ISBN 0763648760
Kennedy, Kim. Pirate Pete's Talk Like a Pirate. Illustrated by Doug Kennedy. ISBN 0810993481
Long, Melinda. How I Became a Pirate. Illustrated by David Shannon. ISBN 0152018484
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