As a class assignment, the author created a series of parody poems inspired by the examples found in Lewis Carroll\u27s Alice in Wonderland

Arnett, Camille

English

Digital Commons @ Butler University

PARODY POEMS CAMILLE ARNETT Granger, Indiana  For my project I wanted to do a small collection of parody poems. It was based originally on the fact that Lewis Carroll included multiple parody poems and original nonsense poems in Alice in Wonderland, and I wanted to, like him, take famous works and put my own unique twist on them. The prospect of writing nonsense poems is rather daunting, and eventually I decided rather than try to write nonsense, which is actually quite difficult, I would try to make some sense of the works while still parodying or modifying them in ways I found to be unique and meaningful.  Taking a poem and modifying it requires purpose: Why am I changing what I am changing? What am I keeping the same? In general, I felt that keeping the structure, meter, and rhyme scheme of the original was important, so that there was obvious resemblance between the original and the modified version. Specifically, with my take on “The Lady of Shalott” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, I wanted to keep the same structure and rhyme scheme to the stanzas: four lines of A, one line of B, three lines of C, one line of B, and so on, keeping the B the same throughout the whole piece. “The Lady of Shalott” has a unique structure that was both difficult and fun to work with.  As an English major I deal frequently with poetry, but I’ve never been an especially talented at writing it. I more often focus on prose and essay writing, because it is what I am better at and what I have more experience with. However, I really love reading poetry, and I wanted to get more practice writing it since it’s an area in which I am a greenhorn. I also have read a lot of great classic poetry thus far in the semester that I wanted to spend more time with in a creative way, not just a critical one.  This project relates most directly to Alice and Wonderland and Lewis Carroll, less so Martin Gardner or John Tenniel. The parody poems in Alice, specifically “How doth the little crocodile” draw from classic poems that were taught to children to teach them to remember their manners and fight, “Against Idleness and Mischief.” Carroll takes popular, well-known children’s literature and makes it absurd.   In a similar vein, I wanted to take famous, widely-taught poems in the classic English canon, and write them differently. I do not want to make fun of them or render them completely absurd, because they are great, meaningful poems, and also because I am not particularly funny. However, borrowing from them stylistically and telling a different, potentially contrasting story, is a fun exercise, and follows in the tradition of Carroll’s parodies.  Lady of Shalott Alfred, Lord Tennyson  [That poem is quite long, there’s a link to it here  https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45359/the-lady-of-shalott-1832]  Lady, Lady, Lady  On either side the river lie Tall fields of barley and of rye, On one were tinged with purple dye, The other the color of the sky Of a stormy inkblot. She had a reason not to go, “The world is unkind, don’t you know? Protect your heart and sit and sew.” She did not care a lot.  Without the walls, aspens shivered Streams of water flow and quivered In the sweeping gray that ever Ate the air and blades and river. South was the town; north, the apricot Tree. It never bloomed in spring So she spent all day dreaming, sewing, But when asked she deflected, saying, “I do not care a lot.”  She said her mantra every hour Watched the gray land from in her tower— Until one day there grew a flower, Then a second, then a shower Of blooms of apricot. Feeling she was no longer trapped The ablation ‘tween her ribs was rapt Yes, something within her had snapped— She chased the apricot.  The curse had been hard to ignore But descending the tower, she bore A capacity to now adore Like she never adored before— For this she cared a lot. She ran to the apricot tree And picked a blossom wild and free And grey devoured it, and the whole tree. “I do not care a lot.”  The chance was taken and was gone. She believed no more good was on Its way to her. The ablation drawn, The mantra came, she was foregone: “I do not care a lot.” How could she know that hope is true! Don’t take that lonely avenue! But—she fell into the river blue Dead as the apricot.  When life becomes too hard to fight And statues crush the land and blight All large and lovely things like mites; In this fervent field of fright— I cannot bear the thought. To watch the land collapse within, To hear forever the betrayed din;  The last chance lost; last, had it been?— I do not care a lot.  I watch her drift here gracefully The southern wind pulsed lazily ‘Gainst her hair—live, it seemed to be No air passed through her lips—Lady, Why did you take your lot? The hand that sewed, the heart that bled, The mind that wanted, needed, plead— The curse a million times was said: “I do not care a lot.”   The Red Wheelbarrow William Carlos Williams  so much depends upon   a red wheel barrow  glazed with rain water  beside the white chickens.    The Red-White Burrow Camille Arnett  so much depends  in  a red-white burrow   glazed with sugar  shining the sun’s sheen.   Ozymandias Percy Shelley  I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; And on the pedestal, these words appear: My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.”   The Ozzy King Parable Camille Arnett  I met a traveler from this antique land, Who said—“There once stood some great statues here, A smiling man, his kind extended hand. Thinking of my sweet likeness, I’m near tears.”  “This land was lush,” I said, “not long ago.” “Yes, child! And I, Ozzy, made bloom far! Great men like me do not die in one go. Our lifetimes stretch beyond farthest star.”  “But friend, if you were wonderful, then why Did all your statues fall from violent blows?” He said, “Well, no one understood what I Wished to fix about their culture, so low.”  I took a piece of ruin, wound, and hit, Pleased the king could rot in the hell he writ. 

Parody Poems

https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5756&amp;context=wordways

Parody Poems

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Digital Commons @ Butler University