sallymurphy.com.au

Sally Murphy, Australian author

Queen Narelle: Three Weeks to Go!

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Just wanted to paws for a minute to remind you that its only THREE MORE WEEKS until Queen Narelle is released – or perhaps, more aptly, until Narelle’s Coronation.

I just can’t wait to share this little book with you and with the whole world – but wait I must, and so must you.

Luckily, I am having fun on Instagram and elsewhere spreading cat jokes and tiaras and other bits and pieces to spread the word.

And three weeks will just whizz by, I’m sure. But, in the meantime, if you want more verse novel fun while you wait, you might check out my previous verse novels;

Pearl Verses the World

Toppling

Roses are Blue and

Worse Things.

All still in print – and, if you click the links you can read more about them and even hear me read extracts of each.

If you want to be at the front of the procession for Queen Narelle, you can preorder now – at your favourite local bookshop or  online.

 

Teacher Tuesday: Eight Great Poetry Titles for Your Classroom

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It’s Teacher Tuesday – though, if you are a regular visitor her you might notice that my Tuesday posts have been a little lax. Apologies: I have been busy with many things, but the good news is that a lot of those things centre around books and writing and poetry.

Speaking of poetry, there is still plenty of time to encourage your students to enter the annual Dorothea Mackellar Poetry Awards, open to school aged students from anywhere in Australia.  A writing contest is a brilliant  way of motivating young writers to write – and, whether or not they win a prize, their poetry is written by a new audience, and every entrant is recognised with a certificate.

If you are wondering where to start, why not begin my just reading – and sharing – lots of different poetry in your classroom?  Here are eight wonderful poetry books that you can access in Australia  and that I personally own and thus am able to recommend.

1. Poems from a Green and Blue Planet, Poems from a Green and Blue Planet, edited by Sabrina Mahfouz (Hodder, 2019).  This anthology is stunning. The cover art (by Aaron Cushley) is supplemented with internal spot illustrations, and the range of poetry is outstanding Including original poems, contemporary poems and classics, the theme is celebrating life on Earth. Suitable for primarya nd secondary readers – and adults too.

2.Untangling Spaghetti: Selected PoemsUntangling Spaghetti: Selected Poems, by Steven Herrick (UQp, 2009). Steven Herrick is the best poet for children and teens in Australia so, while I’ve chosen this collection for this book, any of his other collections or his verse novels could equally have been on this list. Humour, pathos, wry observations and more in accessible free verse with a lot to offer middle and upper primary students especially.

3.Guinea Pig Town and Other Animal PoemsGuinea Pig Town and Other Animal Poems, by Lorraine Marwood (Walker Books, 2013) . Another eminent and accessible Australian poet, and again there were several titles I could recommend, but I have chosen this one because it is a themed collection, which can provide a lot of food for thought and opportunities to consider the different ways a topic can be explored in poetry. Suitable across the primary grades.

4. Common WealthCommon Wealth, by Gregg Dreise (Scholastic, 2021). This is one of my favourite picture books for classroom use at the moment, but is also a slam poem, and so a wonderful poetry resource – modelling the slam style as a tool for persuasive writing. In your classroom it could be used to cover a range of writing and curriculum areas.

5. What Snail KnowsWhat Snail Knows, by Kathryn Apel (ill. by Mandy Foot) (UQP, 2022). This is a verse novel – a story told using free verse, and again, I could have chosne any one of Apel’s verse novels to include in this list. Verse novels offer a wonderful way to explore narrative and poetry at the same time, and this one provides many opportunities to inspire poetry writing, including shape poetry.

6. Roar Squeak Purr: A New Zealand Treasury of Animal Poems Roar Squeak Purr: A New Zealand Treasury of Animal Poems, edited by Paula Green & illustrated by Jenny Cooper (Penguin, 2022). I know I have already included an animal themed collection, but this anthology is stunning, and one my favourite books of 2022. Poems about all kinds of animals – from New Zealand and beyond. Eevery library should have htis – and evry classroom and home too.

7 What Is Poetry?: The Essential Guide to Reading and Writing Poems, What is Poetry? by Michael Rosen (Walker Books, 2017). English poet and amazing person Michael Rosen is THE go to for children’s poetry and only falls so far down this list because I wanted to finish the list with two how-to books. This one is about both how to read and how to write poetry, and can be read by children but also by teachers. It is brilliant, but also check out Rosen’s other poetry and his website and his YouTube and…

8.  Teaching Poetry for Pleasure and Purpose, by Sally Murphy (PETAA, 2021).  I am really proud of this book because it is the book I wished I had when I was classroom teaching.  It unpacks the Australian curriculum as it relates to poetry and for every Primary School year level it then gives a range of lesson ideas, both reading and writing, and a selection of poems (mostly Australian) and other resource suggestions.  I’d be recommending this one even if I didn’t write it.

 

I could go on and on listing books here, but sometimes lists can be overwhelming – so here are eight wonderful books for you to get started – but if you need a recommendation for a specific age group or topic, contact me, or comment here, and I will have a suggestion.   And if there is a topic you would like me to cover in a future Teacher Tuesday post, hit me up!

And, again, don’t forget that the Dorothea Mackellar Poetry  contest is now open for entries. It’s a wonderful opportunity for the young poets in your classroom or your home.  Australia-wide.

Out and About in January

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One of the absolute joys of being an author is the chance to meet and engage with young people.

In January I have two such chances and am still smiling when I think of them.

First, I went up to Perth and, for the first time ever, presented in the Hay Street Mall, a part of Perth I have always loved, as it holds many memories, usually around shopping with first my mum, then my friends and, as an adult, with my husband, children, or by myself. But this visit was special – because in a previously vacant shop space, the Centre for Stories has set up a Story Lounge – and I was invited in, courtesy of the Literature Centre.

I ran a writing workshop for upper primary aged writers, and we had a lot of fun exploring the contents of a Writer’s Toolbox.  I didn’t get any photos, but the Lit Centre posted this lovely story about it, also showcasing the two other writers who were part of the line-up.

Then, just yesterday, I was lucky enough to be invited to a Teddy Bears’ Picnic, hosted by the City of Bunbury Libraries, and held at Maidens Park, not too far from where I live.

 

With Jono and Penny from the Bunbury Library

What fun! I took my trusty old teddy bear, Pandy, who I have had for as long as I can remember, and we read, sang, spoke and laughed to and with lots of children, parents and teddy bears.  The library staff had asked me to read  my first two picture books –  Floatingest Frog (which is still in print) and Pemberthy Bear (which, sadly, isn’t), and it was a real joy to bring these books out for a new audience.

You can see here just how much fun I have reading – I am reading the line “aaaaaaalll the way over here” while Penny and Tanya look on:

 

A park is always a lovely place to share – but this park was extra lovely, with towering gum trees, plenty of shade and – a bonus – a kookaburra laughing along to some of the lines. Pandy had a lovely outing too, and I have promised him he’ll be taken along again one day.

Now I’m back at my desk writing more, reading more, but looking forward to more lovely outings in 2023.

Poetry Friday: Winter is STILL Here

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It’s been over a month since my last Poetry Friday offering and, in that post I was complaining about the cold, and looking for reasons to LIKE winter.

Fast forward to today, and its cold and wet and wintry – and, you guessed it, I am still struggling to find good things about winter.

But, I do have a pair of haiku that I wrote about being cold – and trying to flip between the downsides of being cold and the upsides. Here it is:

Cold

Caught in the rain

Burning of frostbitten toes

Blades of wintry wind

 

A plunge in cold pool

Bubbling fizzing lemonade

Shivering lemonade.

(Copyright Sally Murphy)

Not sure this really counts as flipping the bad to the good – because I seem to be arguing that being cold is winter in bad, but being cold in summer is good. Can you tell I’m a summer person?

But, because I’m a contrary kind of person, I also have a pair of haiku about the pros and cons of being hot.

Hot

Sweat-drenched smelly socks

Suffocating in-school days

Unrelenting sun

 

Thawing spring sunshine

Steam rising from chocolate drink

Toasty slipper toes.

(Copyright Sally Murphy)

 

And you can see that I found the good things about being hot right in the midst of winter.

 

Incidentally, these ‘opposite haikus’ (as I call them) appeared in my book for teachers last year, and were written quite some time before that. It was only when I typed them up for this blog post that I noticed something in the syllable counts. If I’m sticking to a 5/7/5 syllable count for each haiku (and yes, I do know that true haiku do not have to adhere strictly to this count) – then  the line about the chocolate drink is questionable. It depends on pronunciation – the dictionary tells me that it definitely has 3 syllables – choc-o-late – but I confess, when Is ay it it definitely comes out with only two – chock – let – which is how it is that I have never noticed this in my own poem before.

Does it matter? Probably not – although now that I’ve noticed it, it annoys me, because I’m a stickler for rules.

But being distracted by syllable counts has taken my mind of being cold. So that’s gotta be good thing, right?

I’m off to make a hot chocolate and browse the rest of the Poetry Friday posts. They always warm my heart. The Roundup is hosted by Elisabeth – you should check it out 🙂

Some News and Some Thankyous

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The last month has been an absolute whirlwind of emotion and busyness, and several times I have sat down to blog about it and just not even known where to start. But here I am, finally trying to say stuff.

You see, the big news is that my name was included in the Queen’s Birthday Honour List, announcing that I had been awarded an Order of Australia Medal (OAM) for my services to children’s literature and education.  To say that this was an amazing honour is an understatement. You see, as I said to more than one person, it feels like I’ve been rewarded just for getting out of bed in the morning. Truly, the things I do, as both author and as educator, are an absolute pleasure to do. And I did not ever imagine that someone would nominate me for such an award for doing them.

However, it seems someone did indeed nominate me – and I still don’t know who was behind the nomination. SO I want to say thank you to that person (or persons), because it means a lot that you saw what I do and thought it worthy of an award. And I want to  say thank you too, to the selection panel who have to read and check the nominations before recommending that the Governor General endorse them.

And, because it is time for me to these thank you, I want to most especially thank my family – my darling husband (my beloved) my children (the Murphlets) and my grandchildren (the Murphlings) who inspire me to write and who enable my career in so many ways – and who tolerate my absences, and my creative impulses and my mess. And my other family – my Mum (who inspired my love of reading and writing) and my Dad (who isn’t here any more, but I know would have been pretty chuffed) and my siblings and extended family.

And my writing and illustrating colleagues, who walk alongside me, and my teaching and university colleagues and gosh, just everyone who I work with and have worked with.

But, very particularly, if you are reading this, then I want to thank YOU.   Because being a writer is actually very much made special by readers. And I want to thank everyone who has ever read and enjoyed one of my books, poems, blogposts, book reviews, whatevers.

I have received hundreds and hundreds of messages on social media, emails, letters (who even knew they were still a thing!), phonecalls and, of course, in person congratulations.  And this has been such a surprise – that so many people were happy for me and happy with me.  The most life-changing thing about this award is the fact that it has beensuch a lovely reminder of how many people care – and just how very nice people are.  So thank you!

Now I’m back at my desk, writing more, teaching more (the new semester is about to start at my university job) and trying to spread the joy of words with as many people as I can. And promising myself that I will update this blog more regularly ?

In the meantime, I have had a few people ask where the photo of the medal is. The answer is, I don’t have it yet – the ceremony will be in October. But, in the meantime, here is a very serious photo of me, dressed in pink to support my wonderful friend Sue Whiting’s book Pearly and Pig.

Poetry Friday: My Shadow

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Last Friday I shared some of my favourite poems from my childhood. I chose just three, but there were some really fabulous ones that didn’t make last week’s post, including one that ranked a few mentions in the comments: My Shadow, by Robert Louis Stevenson. Coincidentally, I’ve been aware in my many beach walks over the past few months, of how often I capture photos of my own shadow – either deliberately or not ( I call them shadow selfies, except, because they’re of me, they are SALfies).  So, I thought I’d collect up some of those photos and share them, with the poem. As you listen, see if you can spot the dolphins – a mother and her new calf, who I spent an hour walking with a couple of weeks ago.

And, here’s the poem, which is in the public domain:

My Shadow
by Robert Louis Stevenson
I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.
The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow—
Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;
For he sometimes shoots up taller like an India-rubber ball,
And he sometimes gets so little that there’s none of him at all.
He hasn’t got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.
He stays so close beside me, he’s a coward you can see;
I’d think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!
One morning, very early, before the sun was up,
I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;
But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepyhead,
Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.
When I came to post this video and poem I realsied I shared a poem with my shadow once before when I wrote a poem to a Stingray I met on a walk
– and the ray’s response:
Today’s Poetry Friday roundup is hosted by the amazing Carol Varsalona, who is offering gorgeous poems and images from her Nature’s Nurtures  Gallery, as well as her ow not to Mother Nature. Head there now for your Poetry Friday fill.
sallymurphy.com.au