Upon Shel Silverstein's death from a heart attack in 1999, his long-time editor at HarperCollins, Robert Warren, noted in a Publishers Weekly obituary that the poet, illustrator, playwright, songwriter, and humorist "had a genius that transcended age and gender, and his work probably touched the lives of more people than any writer in the second half of the 20th century." Blending the zaniness of Dr. Seuss with the cheek of Edward Lear, and wrapping it all up with a darker edged ribbon than either possessed, Silverstein transformed the genre of nonsense verse and absurdist drawing with his four best-selling books, The Giving Tree, Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic, and Falling Up. Together these books have sold, according to Publishers Weekly, over eighteen million copies in twenty languages around the world. His many creative outlets--as writer, illustrator, playwright, actor, performer, composer of country, pop, and children's...