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ellisknox's review
5.0
I read this when I was a young 'un and have read it several times since. It gets better every time.
schmidtmark56's review
5.0
A wholesome and endearing tome of free verse poems written by a proverbial cockroach. Definitely worth re-reading, especially if you are a fan of winnie the pooh. It takes that Aesopic universe and adds both adult components and intellectual depth. Despite the premise of the book, it's definitely not for children, as it swears quite a bit.
nitzer's review
5.0
Fun, witty, and philosophical musings of a cockroach and a cat. Every poem was a joy to read, and the relatability of the pieces hasn't faded over a century.
jeanetterenee's review
4.0
my best girlfriend and i loved this when we were in high school. archy is a cockroach who types by hopping from key to key on the typewriter, so he can't capitalize anything, and there are some punctuation marks he can't use. mehitabel is his feline friend. very clever and amusing.
kh2912's review against another edition
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
pinknantucket's review
3.0
A lovely little book that I squeezed in right at the end of the ‘thon. From what I understand, this semi-poetry used to appear as columns in an American newspaper, and is purportedly written by Archy the cockroach, a former poet reborn in a more lowly form. As Archy typed this verse by jumping up and down on the keys of a typewriter, there are no punctuation or capital letters. (He couldn’t reach the shift key).
This volume is a collection of Archy’s works, about his life as a poet-turned-cockroach (and emerging lobbyist for insect rights around the world) and about the life of Mehitabel, an alley cat who was actually Cleopatra in a former life. Mehitabel’s life motto is “toujours gai” (“always gay” - I checked with someone who knows) and also, quite often, “wotthehell”.
This books is funny and moving, particularly in the accounts of Mehitabel's adventures. (Maybe that is just because I am a cat person). Although he wrote many wiser and more profound words than this, I will leave you all with one of my favourite of Archy’s “certain maxims”:
The honey bee is sad and cross
And wicked as a weasel
And when she perches on you boss
She leaves a little measle
This volume is a collection of Archy’s works, about his life as a poet-turned-cockroach (and emerging lobbyist for insect rights around the world) and about the life of Mehitabel, an alley cat who was actually Cleopatra in a former life. Mehitabel’s life motto is “toujours gai” (“always gay” - I checked with someone who knows) and also, quite often, “wotthehell”.
This books is funny and moving, particularly in the accounts of Mehitabel's adventures. (Maybe that is just because I am a cat person). Although he wrote many wiser and more profound words than this, I will leave you all with one of my favourite of Archy’s “certain maxims”:
The honey bee is sad and cross
And wicked as a weasel
And when she perches on you boss
She leaves a little measle
mrskatiefitz's review
3.0
This book by newspaper reporter Don Marquis collects poems written in the voice of a cockroach named Archy for the Evening Sun in New York beginning in 1916. Archy is said to be a former free verse poet whose soul has "transmigrated" into the body of a cockroach. Because Archy is an insect, he cannot make use of the shift key on the typewriter he uses to compose his poems, so they are all written without capitalization. Archy writes on many topics, and the poems often poke fun at human nature using animal- and insect-related metaphors. Archy's most frequently covered topic is the life and times of Mehitabel, the alley cat, who has a variety of entanglements with charming tom cats who try to use and manipulate her, but who always insists on maintaining an optimistic outlook no matter what.
I first read this book when I was in high school. I had found some quotations by Don Marquis in a book my dad had in his office, and looked him up at the public library. Though much of the philosophical references in the book went over my head back then, I found the premise amusing, and some of the one-liners Archy delivers became my favorite quotations. On this reading, I appreciated more of the political and social commentary that Archy makes, though I'm not sure I agreed with him on very much. I will say, though, that for being over 100 years old, these poems hold up quite well, and many of the themes are still relevant to our culture today.
This review also appears on my Instagram.
I first read this book when I was in high school. I had found some quotations by Don Marquis in a book my dad had in his office, and looked him up at the public library. Though much of the philosophical references in the book went over my head back then, I found the premise amusing, and some of the one-liners Archy delivers became my favorite quotations. On this reading, I appreciated more of the political and social commentary that Archy makes, though I'm not sure I agreed with him on very much. I will say, though, that for being over 100 years old, these poems hold up quite well, and many of the themes are still relevant to our culture today.
This review also appears on my Instagram.
oldpondnewfrog's review
4.0
An Amazon reviewer said "Writers (particularly journalists) can go lifetimes without attaining such loose-limbed grace," and I think that's a really well-chosen description of his style: loose-limbed grace. Perfect tone for his characters, but fresh, slangy, casual and formal in the same breath, and with an unusual combination of humor and melancholy floating around and within other like an expertly balanced chili-passionfruit margarita.
Archy is a cockroach who used to be a vers libre poet in a former life. He types on Marquis's typewriter at night, jumping on the keys one by one to operate the machine. He can't work the capital letters (because they need the shift key pressed at the same time), and he has trouble with line breaks. "We never saw a cockroach work so hard or perspire so freely in all our lives before," writes Marquis. Writing is exhausting to Archy, but it's important so he does it.
Archy is polite but also blunt.
His friend Mehitabel, the alley cat, is great too. I love her long-winded repetitiveness. "toujours gai archy toujours gai is what I always say always a lady i m a free spirit archy there s a dance in the old dame yet wotthehell wotthehell there s a dance in the old dame yet. She reminds me of certain older ladies I have known.
Great line breaks.
Archy is a cockroach who used to be a vers libre poet in a former life. He types on Marquis's typewriter at night, jumping on the keys one by one to operate the machine. He can't work the capital letters (because they need the shift key pressed at the same time), and he has trouble with line breaks. "We never saw a cockroach work so hard or perspire so freely in all our lives before," writes Marquis. Writing is exhausting to Archy, but it's important so he does it.
Archy is polite but also blunt.
thank you for the apple peelings in the wastepaper basketI loved Archy trading insults with the Met's pharaoh mummy—the small and the great just having fun jibing each other, almost tenderly, humor and pathos, they are strangers but also strangely intimate, maybe because each has few other friends:
but your paste is getting so stale i can t eat it
...
don t you ever eat any sandwiches in your office
or a piece of ham or anything but apple parings
and paste leave a piece of paper in your machine
every night you can call me archy
kingly has beenThe poor desiccated pharaoh mummy just wants beer, it's all he thinks of, ice-cold beer...
says i
what was your ambition
when you had any
insignificant
and journalistic insect
you must be respectful
in the presence
of a mighty desolation
little archy
forty centuries of thirst
look down upon you
His friend Mehitabel, the alley cat, is great too. I love her long-winded repetitiveness. "toujours gai archy toujours gai is what I always say always a lady i m a free spirit archy there s a dance in the old dame yet wotthehell wotthehell there s a dance in the old dame yet. She reminds me of certain older ladies I have known.
Great line breaks.
the longer i live the more iJust realized this is the centennial of Archy's first appearance. I hope he's been reincarnated since into whatever "higher" life form he wants to be. But I think I like him best as a cockroach.
realize that everything is
relative even morality is
relative things you would not do
sometimes you would do other
times for instance i would not consider
it honorable in me as a
righteous cockroach to crawl into a
near sighted man s soup that
man would not have a sporting chance but
with a man with ordinarily good eye
sight i should say it was
up to him to watch his soup himself and
yet if i was very tired and hungry
i would crawl into even a near
sighted man s soup knowing all the
time it was wrong and my necessity would
keep me from reproaching myself too
bitterly afterwards you can
not make any hard and fast rule
concerning the morality of crawling into
soup nor anything else a certain
alloy of expediency improves the
gold of morality and makes
it wear all the longer