Although young adult verse novel had a resurgence in the 1990s (Alberts, nd), works for adults by Derek Walcott, Dorothy Porter, and Fred D’Aguiar, and for young adults simultaneously written with novels by Virginia , Euwer Wolff and Karen Hesse (Cadden, 2011). the genre traces back to earlier times, the book-length monologues were used in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to present young readers with didactic stories, reflecting the belief that the physical action of recitation would reinforce the moral message (Ruwe, 2009).
According to Cart, the modern verse novel began to excite interest about the same time as poetry generally did and in the young adult world two of the first were Mel Glenn's My Friend's Got This Problem, Mr. Candler (1991) and Virginia Euwer Wolffs' Make Lemonade (1994) (Cart, 2016).
Jeri Kroll (2010) calls the verse novel ‘interstitial’, arguing that it forces the writer to question the collaboration between poetry and narrative. There was a bit of information sharing on the controversy of verse novels, being that they are not to par with other genres, and whether they are poetry or narrative, and since they are a combination of both has been a critique. Being the novel is still the most popular genre in the young adult literature market, Cadden argues in by calling it “a novel,” it allows for publishers and authors to reassure readers that what they have purchased, they will enjoy (Cadden, 2011). Despite these arguments, the verse novel has been a popular genre in the Young Adult world. Cart argued the connection of the poetry world with narrative, and credited poetry's new popularity, with the combination of novels in verse, and he described it as book-length works of narrative poetry. (Cart, 2016). Some authors have argued that their books are not verse novels, Wolff's from Make Lemonade has not considered her books in verse, and has attributed reviewers are labeling her books, in -verse. She stated that, she considers them written in pose, and that she uses Stanza, and her thinking of young mothers reading her books, and wanting to give them lots of white space, to read entire chapters to feel a sense of accomplishment. (Comerford, 2009)
Cart, M. (2016). Young Adult Literature From Romance to Realism
Cadden, M. (2011). The Verse Novel and The Question of Genre. The Alan Review, 39(1); https://doi.org/10.21061/alan.v39i1.a.3
Comerford, Lynda B. (2009) "Q and A with Virginia Euwer Wolff" Publishers Weekly, February 5. Retrieved from www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/new-titles/adult-annoucements/articl/3348-a-amp-a-with-virginia-euwer-wolff.html.
Ruwe, D. (2009). Dramatic monologues and the novel-in-verse: Adelaide O’Keeffe and the development of the theatrical children’s poetry in the long eighteenth century. The Lion and the Unicorn, 33 , 219–34.
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