The Basket Counts - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0689801084 ISBN 13: 9780689801082

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing, 2000

Synopsis

This collection of twentyeight poems captures the excitement and spirit of competition as experienced by players of all ages on basketball courts throughout the nation.

About this title

From School Library Journal

Grade 5-8-Adoff's visual and rhythmic poetry suits his subject well. Twenty-eight original poems describe the action and contemplation, sensation, and frustration of the game of basketball in the voices of short, tall, male, female, wheelchair-bound, and homeless young adults. The words are set precisely on the page, with varying letter spacing and justification, so that the shape of the text, white space, and title are as important as the words themselves. And yet, as important as the poems are visually, they need to be read aloud: "-pebble/rubber/ball/popping/up into/my right/palm-." Young people should enjoy reading these selections to one another, whether they are fans of the sport or not. Weaver's brightly colored illustrations, which feature urban kids of different races, are somewhat distracting. Adoff does such a brilliant and unique job of describing action, form, and motion through sound and structure that the bright pictures, depicting the illustrator's view of the action, make it difficult to concentrate on the actual poems. This title is suitable for a slightly younger audience than Charles R. Smith, Jr.'s Rimshots (Dutton, 1999). It is reminiscent of Robert Burleigh's Hoops (Harcourt, 1997), but offers a wider selection.
Nina Lindsay, Oakland Public Library, CA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Publishers Weekly

There is a studied pomp to both art and text in this collection of poems about basketball. Weaver's debut artwork is sometimes visually interesting, as when high-rise buildings menacingly dwarf the city playground chain-link fence, or when a wheelchair-bound player pops "the s h a r p e s t wheelchair/ wheeeelies." His full-page paintings feature careening angles, skewed perspectives, a multicultural cast of characters and hip teens. Often, however, Weaver's attempt to convey symbolic action is cartoon-like: literal flames surround players who are in the zone as the text announces, "Me/ hot./ You/ burn." Abstract curlicues swirl around the ball, net and players to suggest movement. While Adoff's "shaped speech" (made manifest in unorthodox letter spacing) is authoritative, it tends to call attention to itself rather than amplify the substance of the poems. Despite its striking cover of a basketball with a Seurat-like pebbled surface and shiny black lines, this self-conscious book about shooting hoops misses the mark. Ages 8-12. (Feb.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0689801084
• ISBN 13: 9780689801082
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 48
• Illustrator: Weaver Mike