Randall Jarrell emerged after World War II as a leading American poet and critic. By the time he began writing children's books in 1962, he had published seven volumes of poetry (one of which had won a National Book Award), two highly significant books of criticism, and a satirical novel. Though he died only three years later, he made an impressive contribution to children's literature, with books such as The Bat-Poet (1964) and The Animal Family (1965) almost certainly destined to become classics.

Born in Nashville, Tennessee, Jarrell was educated at Vanderbilt University, receiving a B.A. degree in 1936 and an M.A. in 1939. Except for service in the U.S. Army Air Corps as a celestial-navigation instructor and tower operator (1942-1946), he spent his adult life teaching as brilliantly as he wrote. Many of his students, some of them now writers of note themselves, remember his frequent remark that were...