LanterneRouge

A limerick a week #31

It could be verse …

I’m never quite sure why the Japanese literary art of haiku is so revered.

I get that (traditionally) a haiku has a strict structure and comprises three lines with a sequence of five, seven and five moras. (Apparently moras are sound structures in Japanese that are similar to, but not the same as, syllables).

… I get that they mostly don’t rhyme.

… I get that they comprise two phrases placed together for contrast.

… I even get that at times (usually?) they seem to lack meaning.

What I don’t get (and this is what I really don’t get) is why they are held up as examples of high literary art when the humble limerick is looked down upon from those immersed in ‘high’ culture

After all limericks have a defined structure like haiku, in their case comprising five lines in which, strictly, the first, second and fifth should each have nine syllables and the rest only six. Admittedly they differ from haiku as the longer lines each rhyme as do the two shorter ones, but that just makes them harder to construct.

You can even get technical in their definition as they are quintains with a strict rhyme scheme and anapestic meter in which the first, second and third lines are triplets, comprising three anapests and the others are couplets with only two. As an anapest is a three-syllabic clause usually with emphasis on the third syllable, a limerick is phrased thus:

Tee tee tum, tee tee tum, tee tee tum
Tee tee tum, tee tee tum, tee tee tum
Tee tee tum, tee tee tum
Tee tee tum, tee tee tum
Tee tee tum, tee tee tum, tee tee tum.

Although that is strict definition of a limerick’s meter they don’t all follow such an exact scheme; however, modern conventions in haiku also break from strict tradition, so clearly both forms are flexible. (It’s rare that my limericks are precise enough in their meter to correspond to the strictest definition, but sometimes a chap has to compromise as you’ll see later).

The modern tradition of limerick writing almost compels them to incorporate clever word play and, if possible, subtle innuendo. If you can get meter, word play and innuendo matched, then you have the perfect limerick. I’m still striving for that. I struggle to achieve more than one out of the three in my efforts in A limerick a week, but it’s fun to try.

Last week’s offering was close to a strict anapestic meter, failing only due to a missing syllable in the last line. In fact, I had a version that did match correctly, but it didn’t read as well as the syllable-deprived version. The final version was:

When a Teutonic torso arose
I was tempted to yell: “Thar she blows!”
‘Cos the scene that I viewed
Was an adipose nude
Afloat in a supine repose.

The alternative, and anapestically correct version, had as its final line:

All afloat in a supine repose.

Try both endings and see which you prefer (hopefully you’ll agree with me that the sacrifice of a single syllable was worth it – either that or you’ll think I’m a complete pillock for letting such things bother me).

So, how did an interest in limericks arise? Surprisingly, not from an introduction to the work of Edward Lear (famous for popularising limericks in the 19th century, although his commonly ended the first and fifth lines with the same word in contrast to current practice).

No, the first that really grabbed attention in my early years was this one:

There was a young fellow called Clyde
Who fell in a cess pit and died.
He had a young brother
Who fell in another
And now they’re interred side by side!

It was the double meaning implied by interred that made it memorable. It is quite a well-known limerick, with lots of variants, but this is the version that I remember and it is still one of my favourites.

I first heard another favourite on a old vinyl record. As an undergraduate I’d won a couple of such LPs in a raffle. One featured a Scottish folk duo, the Corries, on a ‘live’ album that included one very short track, ‘Abigail’:

On the bosom of young Abigail
Was written the price of her tail
And upon her behind
For the use of the blind
Was the same information in braille!

Not very PC nowadays, but still, I think, very clever.

So, there we are. There are many bloggers and twitterers producing limericks today. Not all are clever and too many are crude rather than rude, but there are some really good ones out there and, for me, they hold their own against haiku.

Meantime, here is this week’s none-too-clever, but anapestically-correct limerick of the week:

A limerick’s a kind of a verse
Of the sort that I like to disburse,
But it seems that sometimes
I don’t quite get the rhymes
Or the metrical foot is perverse!

Postscript#1: I’ve only ever written one haiku. It was after a tedious work-related discussion on producing guidelines for almost anything and everything that we do.

Chris, a now-retired colleague, had expressed his frustration in the following way that also reflected our collective practice of resorting to limericks in our business planning:

Generally
Users
In
Denial,
Ensuing
LImericks,
Never
Ending
Storms (in tea-cups).

To me, that sounded like it should be a haiku, but it wasn’t, so with a wee bit of thought it was turned into a wannabe Japanese aphorism in which the juxtaposition of contrasting phrases delivers a meaningless expression – except that in this case it is surprisingly meaningful (to me) in the work context outlined above:

Storms brew in tea-cups
As guidelines grow profusely
Into limericks.

Postscript#2: Limericks are generally thought to be named after the city or county of Limerick in Eire, possibly drawn from a version of nonsense verse popular in the area.

Postscript#3: The ex-Python, Michael Palin, has published two volumes of limericks. Some good, some not-so-good, but with the advantage of having an artist to illustrate them. That’s cheating!

Quotes that made me laugh #31

I’m a couple of years off it in body, and hopefully many years off it in mind, but my sister’s recent 60th birthday got me looking into other folks’ reactions on hitting that age.

One article that I found in the Graun was written a few years ago by Ian Martin, one of the writers of The Thick Of It. His 60 thoughts about turning 60 provided three that I feel should be shared here, including one that made me laugh out loud …

The first, on the government of Cameron, Osborne et al:

“But I cannot remember ever before feeling the visceral contempt I have for this gang of posh sociopaths. As a rough guide, I would say any government that sets the welfare of the comfortably off above the welfare of the old, the young, the sick, the poor, the oppressed, the disabled … well, call me old-fashioned but any government like that wants hosing down the drain.”

… the second, on abhorring violence as “it never solves problems”:

“Why, then, do I keep thinking that if I had two weeks left to live and just one decent throw of the arm left in me, oh man, I would really want to punch Iain Duncan Smith in the face.”

… and, finally (the one that made me laugh) on thinking twice before speaking ill of people:

“Before you say anything nasty about someone, just pause for a second and browse through some really good adjectives in your head.”

Technology – giving it the finger!

When your phone uses fingerprint recognition to unlock the screen, it’s at times like this …

… that you wish you could remember your back-up password 😁

Postscript: ‘Twas Good Friday yesterday, so here (and only one day late) are my hot cross buns …

(No elastoplasts were involved in the making of these buns, the finger had healed by then. I’d also forgotten just how satisfying it is to knead dough properly – I’d learned last year at Bread Ahead in Borough Market and I’m hoping to return there to do their boulangerie workshop -Complete French Baking – later this year).

A limerick a week #30

Just add water …

Thermal baths are ‘big’ in the southwestern German state of Baden-Württemberg, as is much of their clientele to the extent that I feel positively slim when I saunter to the local spa on visits to my family in Spielberg. I always think it ironic that such health spas sell a lot of beer and jumbo portions of cake; goods that are hardly commensurate with the philosophy of ein Kur machen.

An interesting cloud formation or an underwater perspective of a Chunky Dunker doing backstroke?

At the moment, my sister’s local thermalbäder requires swimwear to be worn in its spa pools as you are massaged (pummelled!) by high pressure water jets. That is a good thing, because I am too culturally hidebound (ie British) to take advantage of its saunas which require you to strip off completely (although plans are afoot to create a separate ‘nude only’ spa pool at the Albtherme – surely something to be avoided at all costs, but handy inspiration for this week’s limerick).

So, in honour of the unadorned Teutonic approach to saunas and health spas, an approach that also encompasses both beer and Kaffee und Kuchen, I give you:

When a Teutonic torso arose
I was tempted to yell: “Thar she blows!”
‘Cos the scene that I viewed
Was an adipose nude
Afloat in a supine repose.

Banter and Bollocks

I recently read an article on idioms from foreign languages that, when translated, seem to have no obvious meaning in one’s own language. One of the examples came from Sweden: att glida in på en räkmacka that translates literally as: to slide in on a shrimp sandwich and which seemingly refers to a person that didn’t have to work to get to where they are.

And this is where I need your help! A short while ago I read about an old bit of RAF banter. It made me laugh out loud, but I haven’t a clue what it means. Any suggestions are welcome. Here it is:

‘An insult’s an insult, but a chair leg up the a**e – that’s furniture!‘

A limerick a week #29

MMXVII – MCMLVII = LX

In honour of my big sister’s landmark birthday (and dependency on wine), I give you:

The fruit of the grape may assuage
The fact that she’s now reached the age
Where an ‘owd Cumbrian lass’
Can pick up a pass
For an omnibus birthday rampage.

“With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come, and rather let my liver heat with wine than my heart cool with mortifying groans”. Or is it just wind?

Quotes that made me laugh #30

What’s religion got to do with it?

A pair of Saint Johnstone footballers were sent off a couple of days ago for fighting each other instead of playing the opposition. So that’s at least two sinners in a team whose nickname is the ‘Saints’. Sadly, we shall never know what their manager thought of it because in keeping with the scriptural theme of saints and sinners, his comment was:

“The referee has said they were both sent off for violent conduct so obviously he feels he has made the right decision but I haven’t seen it with my own eyes so I am not going to comment on heresy”.

(I know! It’s poor sub-editing and not a quote, but it still made me laugh😎).

Postscript: Years ago I heard Emo Philips tell a ‘heresy-themed’ joke on the TV. I loved it for its softly stated and sublime ridiculing of dogmatic puritanism and bigotry in religions, but could never remember enough different Baptist sects to tell it the way he did. So with the help of Dr Google here it is …

Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, “Don’t do it!” He said, “Nobody loves me.”

I said, “God loves you. Do you believe in God?” He said, “Yes.”

I said, “Are you a Christian or a Jew?” He said, “A Christian.”

I said, “Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?” He said, “Protestant.”

I said, “Me, too! What denomination?” He said, “Baptist.”

I said, “Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?” He said, “Northern Baptist.”

I said, “Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?” He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist.”

I said, “Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?” He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region.”

I said, “Me, too!” Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?” He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912.”

I said, “Die, heretic” and pushed him over.

A limerick a week #28

A threesome with Priscilla…

I suppose my flirtations with Priscilla could be described as more mano a vano than mano a mano, nevertheless we have enjoyed some quiet trysts in secluded, out-of-the-way places; however, as with any developing relationship, others may feel excluded and thus Management decided that if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.

So the three of us headed west last weekend to what must have been a couple of the warmest and sunniest March days that Wester Ross has ever experienced, and to Management’s first overnight assignation with Priscilla and me.

Because Priscilla is a bijou little thing (“reet la’al” as I would have said in my youth) we were a little worried that the two of us would overwhelm her, but we didn’t and she fit us in with room to spare.

… but the roads were awfully congested:

So why did the cows cross the road? To get to the udder side of course! (The apparent gaseous emissions from the rear of the coos are, in fact, reflections from Priscilla’s windscreen).

… and this week’s limerick is:

Anticipating a cool sense of frisson
We went to the Highlands to see some
Scenery galore
And I’ll tell you, what’s more,
We slept with Priscilla – in a threesome.

Postscript: Me, supine and snapping on our weekend away:

“You’re not drunk if you can lie on the floor without hanging on”. Dean Martin

Staying focused

The Gray’s Art College short course exhibition has now finished and was a great success. There are some really skilled practitioners across the various disciplines that were on show. (I’ve already enrolled for next year’s analogue photography course and look forward to receiving my next student card!).

Meantime, I’ve decided that only three-and-a-half-year-olds should be allowed as critics at the show. Why? Simply because I was emailed by the mother of one such child who so liked one of my photographs that he wanted to take it home with him. The lad has taste and thanks to a helpful colleague I have now had the photograph digitised so that I can print a copy and frame it to give to the young man as he clearly knows fine art when he sees it:

Wiener Straßenbahn. My attempt at street photography

This picture of a tram was probably my personal favourite from my entries in the exhibition, but it always annoys me to look at it. Why? Because if you look at the hotel to the right, the building is not aligned vertically. It was a difficult picture to print, lots of regions that needed different exposures or contrasts which I managed okay, but I forgot the simple expedient of checking the verticals were, er, vertical <<expletive deleted>>. Meantime:

How many photographers does it take to change a light bulb?

Ten. One to change the light bulb, eight to share experiences of changing light bulbs and how the light bulb could have been changed differently, and a photography tutor to be politely underwhelmed by your ability to change light bulbs in the first place.

A limerick a week #27

So, Dame Vera Lynn hit 100 ‘not out’ this week and, in recognition of that, here is a limerick that I penned a few years ago along with some recycled verbiage to go along with it …

I suspect that nowadays only a few people will know of more than two Vera Lynn songs: “We’ll meet again” and “The White Cliffs of Dover”. The latter wistfully imagined bluebirds soaring and sweeping dreamily over the white cliffs of Dover. In fact, the song’s author was an American that had never visited the UK and, as pedants of the world will tell you, neither had the bluebirds! And this is my take on how the cliffs got their name:

The song says that birds will be over
Some cliffs by the sea and, moreover,
I’ll tell you outright
It’s all the bird sh*te
That makes them the ‘white’ cliffs of Dover!