Runny Babbit: A Billy Sook

by Shel Silverstein

Other authorsShel Silverstein (Illustrator)
Hardcover, 2015

Call number

J 811 SIL

Publication

HarperCollins (2015), Edition: Illustrated, 96 pages

Description

Runny Babbit lent to wunch And heard the saitress way, "We have some lovely stabbit rew -- Our Special for today." From the legendary creator of Where the Sidewalk Ends , A Light in the Attic , Falling Up , and The Giving Tree comes an unforgettable new character in children's literature. Welcome to the world of Runny Babbit and his friends Toe Jurtle, Skertie Gunk, Rirty Dat, Dungry Hog, Snerry Jake, and many others who speak a topsy-turvy language all their own. So if you say, "Let's bead a rook That's billy as can se," You're talkin' Runny Babbit talk, Just like mim and he.

User reviews

LibraryThing member ohjanet
I bike this look a lot. It's not roo easy to tead aloud, but it's tun to fry wany-ay.
LibraryThing member Meg_Harrison
Children who enjoy word play and Dr. Seuss will fall into a heap of giggles trying to read Runny Babbit. The initial letters of phrases have been switched with hilarious results. Reading this book from cover to cover left my class in stitches and they begged to hear it again and again. This is also
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a great inspiration for new forms of poetry and a refreshing way to begin teaching idioms.(Just look at the pictures for how word play is important to meaning!)
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LibraryThing member Omrythea
By switching the beginning sounds of two different words, a billy sook (silly book) is created. The animal poems are short, fun and delightful to listen to. I love this!!!
LibraryThing member mrs.mackey
"Runny Babbit" begins with an explaination on how the author has rearranged words to make silly rhymes. It is a collection of poems with a bunny rabbit as the main character. The poems describe various things that happen in the bunny rabbit's everyday life. For example, in one of the poems the
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bunny decides to give himself a hair cut. He tells his mother the barber did it. When his mother scolds the barber the barber swears he didn't do it. The poem of course is written with the letters arranged abnormally.

This book was very cute. I found it to be difficult to read. I had to read it very slowly in order to understand what the poem was saying.

In the classroom, I would have my class try and write their own silly poem the way that Shel Silverstein wrote this one. Everyone who wanted to share their poem could. I would not grade this assignment. This assignment would just be for fun.
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LibraryThing member LDB2009
A funny story told in spoonerisms...the first sound of pairs of words transposed. The story takes Runny Babbit through a bunch of activities with his friends...Toe Jurtle, Rirty Dat, and other. My students loved this story and I enjoyed watching them try to wigure out the fords. The illustrations
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are just as silly as the story, too. It's a fun read but this stoofy gory will make your stongue tumble.
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LibraryThing member Czrbr
Book Description: New Hardcover. Published by Harpercollins Childrens Books. . 1ST EDITION. New, not a used item. Multiple copies may be available.
LibraryThing member danielleburry
A book of poems that follows the character Runny Babbit. Each of the poems has mixed up, tongue tied words and it quite funny to read!
LibraryThing member jkessluk
A collection of about forty poems with basic, cute, black and white drawings for each poem. The trading of the first letter of select words adds a cuteness to the story, but is a challenge for me to read, because I am constantly trying to place the letters in the right spaces. If you do not mind
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that then this is a very creative set of bunny themed poems. Pour Runny Babbit can't seam to get things quite right though.
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LibraryThing member DayehSensei
This Silverstein collection involves a signficant amount of word play (runny babbit; fappy bamily) that students will find hilarious and fun to "unscramble." This book will inspire them to have fun with poetry, reading, and language. This book has been a hit with any age group I read it to.
LibraryThing member victoria-hill
Use this book with many grades to encourage phonemic awareness skills and encourage word play. Younger children can listen and identify the mixed up words, while older students
LibraryThing member rwetherell
This is a collection of several silly poems about a character named Runny Babbit. He meets several other characters and deals with daily life, the whole time throughout the poems he mixes up the letters to the words to make them more funny. I think this will also challenge the reader and make them
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learn English better by making them try to figure out what everything would say without the letters mixed up.
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LibraryThing member shannonbaker
Good for all ages. Filled with silliness. Teaches students its ok to be silly sometimes but you always should respect people.
LibraryThing member jensenc
Fun idea, hard to read and follow.
LibraryThing member sarahbatte
This book is written the way the title is spelled, in a backwards sort of way. Thsi is classic Silverstien. In one poem he wears a bowboy cat.
LibraryThing member nkertz
silverstein has fun with words in this book. he scrambles letters up and creates new mixed up words that are easy to decipher. a lesson about having fun with language could be incorporated with this book.
LibraryThing member LainaBourgeois
Flip-flopped consonants add to the loony, never-before-published poems of the late, legendary Silverstein.
LibraryThing member NanceeL
kids may like this, me not so much, poetry done in a topsy turvy language
LibraryThing member Bettyest
Silly rhymes/poems that are presented in a mixed up kind of way: Runny Babbit = Bunny Rabbit.
LibraryThing member jennyo
If you have children who like wordplay and silliness, you must read them this book. If you don't, you must find some children and read it to them. But practice first. It's harder to read than Fox in Socks (another of our family's favorites). As you probably already guessed from the title, Runny
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Babbit and his friends have an unusual quirk, they tend to litch swetters as tey thalk. It gets sillier and sillier, and Silverstein's manic genius really shines through. My daughter (the five year old) got the giggles so bad when I said, "ficken charmer," that I was afraid she wouldn't be able to breathe.

The page that sent them both completely around the bend was the one in which Runny Babbit sits down in a chair marked PET WAINT. It goes like this:

His ears are stet and wicky,
His taws are sticky, poo.
His whiskers are all icky,
His gur is full of foo.
His butt is plue and burple,
His rail is ted, indeed.
Why? Because poor Runny Babbit
Never rearned to lead.

Something tells me we're going to have to read this one and the book of Ogden Nash poems we checked out from the library again tomorrow night.
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LibraryThing member tripleblessings
Grade 1 to 6? Too difficult for preschoolers. Very hard to read aloud! You either love it or don't like it at all, since it's a one-joke book.
LibraryThing member Skaide1
This was another great book by Shel Silverstein. It is a book about a Bunny Rabbit and all the adventures he goes on, and they don't have to connect from page to page. The writing in this book, however is what makes it even more of a winner.

As expressed by the title "Runny Babbit: A billy sook,"
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the whole book is written with a play on words. Sentences vary from standard English to words with their letters all jumbled up, yet still understandable to readers.

I can't really tell if their is a main message in this book, yet if I had to say, I would say it is just to have fun, and be silly! Shel Silverstein combines his drawings and his writing to create masterpieces, and he is without a doubt, one of my favorite authors. I loved this book overall!
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LibraryThing member adriennelaine
This is a poetry book of nonsensical poems about woodland creatures.
LibraryThing member smcamp1234
Gust jot done with seading Runny Babbitt to my ron.
He said, "Lad I dove beading rooks better than tovies and mv."
And of we go to the library to bick another pook to tead rogether.
LibraryThing member ARQuay
Shel Silverstein’s final poetry collection, Runny Babbit: A Billy Sook, published several years after his death, will surely please any fan hoping for one last laugh with the popular poet. Although not quite as successful as his other classics, Where the Sidewalk Ends or The Giving Tree, anyone
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faithful to the warmth and humor of Silverstein’s poetry and illustrations will not be disappointed by Runny Babbit.
Runny Babbit, as you might have guessed, is a bunny rabbit. Silverstein introduces Runny’s world at the opening of the book as such: “They do thing and they say things/In a different sort of way--/Instead of sayin’ ‘purple hat’/They say ‘hurple pat’.” The entirety of the book continues in this way, with short poems typical of the author that dive straight to the joke.
Runny Babbit is the sort of book with the potential to either frustrate reluctant readers or be their savior. Most likely it will be the latter, as the rhymes are simply patterned and predictable, and a child should feel safer to make mistakes since most of the words are scrambled in the first place. Silverstein’s work has a freshness to it that does not fade with rereading; just the sort of author one would want to read as a child only to find that you cannot wait to someday read it to your children and your children’s children.
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LibraryThing member AngelaBates
Summary:
Runny Babbitt is a fun and silly book of poetry written by well known author, Shel Silverstein, however it wasn't published until after his death. This book has over 40 poems written with letters switched around to make it silly and interesting rhymes about the life of "Runny
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Babbitt.

Personal Reaction:
This was a cute book that I am sure most children would find entertaining and fun, however, as an adult I found it hard to read and time consuming and it could be frustrating for some students.

Classroom Extensions:
1. I would use this book at the end of the school day and I would read a couple poems a day until the book was finished just as entertainment for my students.
2. I would use this book to show an alternate style of poetry for my students to learn about and I would challenge my students to write their own poem in this silly way and share with the class.
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Awards

ISBN

9780060256531
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