Light Verse Bake-off
 

I have had a PM from Janice asking how exactly you enter the Light Verse Bake-off. What you do is to send your piece of Light Verse by e mail, either in the body of the email or as an attachment, to me at

jwhitworthpoetAT_SIGN_HEREtalktalk.net.

OK?

John, is there a cut-off date?

Yes. For some of us, the Muse only drops by at the very last minute, so we need to know which minute that will be. GMT.

Hi John,

I hope you won't mind, but I've taken the liberty of editing your post above to modify the email link. If you use your "raw" email address on a web page, you're setting yourself up for a huge spike in spam volume.

Anyway, just in case anyone's not clear, the phrase AT_SIGN_HERE of course is to be replaced with the usual @ sign when entering John's address in your email program. (You see, I can say that here: the automated spam bots don't actually understand real English, they just copy the address and start mailing you . . . well you know the rest.)

Again, John, forgive me if this seems like an intrusion. But I thought I'd make the change right away, before too many of our electronic visitors cottoned on to you.

Steve C.

Thank you, Stephen, I'm sure you are right. I am ashamed to say I don't know the cut-off date. I'm sure I was told, probably by Tim Murphy, but I have forgotten. Can anyone help?

John, you can issue your "Call for Light Verse" on the three po boards anytime, now that we've completed the translation bake-off. In "Upcoming" I'd said we'd do light verse Sept 1, so now would probably be a good time. Pick your own cut-off date, and allow yourself a few days to sift and critique your finalists.

While you're at it, John, any words of wisdom about what you're looking for would be nice. Are children's poems okay? Limericks or shorter forms? Do you prefer serious/light with genuine emotion, or is mere fluff and wordplay in the running? Chris didn't mention until after he made his selections for the Translation bake-off that he didn't want too many sonnets, and that kind of information would be useful as we are selecting our one poem to submit to you. Please don't be inscrutable.

I've been called many things, but inscrutable isn't one of them. Here are some winners.

The Microbe by Hilaire Belloc
Ballade of Suicide by G.K. Chesterton
I've Got a Little List by W.S. Gilbert
Jesus Found Me a Parking Space by Wendy Cope
Windows Is Shutting Down by Clive James
Lollipops of the Pomeranian Baroque by James Fenton

WOT no yanks? Well who won LAST year?

Any damn thing at all by Ogden Nash
Occupational Hazard by Sophie Hannah
Keats' Sonnet about a cat
Arizona Nature Myth by James Michie


I like rhyme and scanning but you knew that. Light verse encompasses many things

Yes, Roger, that was too bad. Of course, I didn't realize I didn't want too many sonnets until I got them. I do have the feeling that we all see and read and write enough sonnets & I was interested in variety. I regret my lack of transparency in that matter.

Chris

In last year's LV bake-off we were allowed to have a guess at who'd written what, which was great fun. In the recent sonnet bake-off we weren't permitted to do this. Can we have the guessing game back?

Well, as far as I'm concerned, you can, but there may be some arcane reason you shouldn't. However, if nopbody hollers, just go ahead. It ought not to be too hard to pick a Holly out. Especially for you, of course.

No reason at all why people shouldn't guess, and that was allowed in the recent bakeoff. The only thing we discourage is spilling the beans when you know.

Thank you, Maryann. Now all is clear.

John, please tell us the deadline!

John doesn't like deadlines. It's his secret. So everyone, please stop asking.

Well deadline is such a morbid word at that. I can see John's reluctance. And "cut-off" has bad associations as well. Maybe John could just suggest, using the subjunctive case at least once or twice, the range of dates that would delight him most?

The subjunctive is a MOOD.

--Your friendly neighborhood pedant.

Yes, I stand corrected. I'm often in a subjunctive mood before I've had my coffee.

28th August. There now. I am preparing a definitive statement to appear on lotsa boards. I wish I understood the clever thing Stephen did which means I don't have to tell anyone my email address. But you can all do it through his magic portal. I've got some nice light verse already but I need LOTS more.

I didn't give enough examples of American light verse that I like. Stuff by Joe Kennedy. Stuff by Sam Gwynn. Stuff by a fellow who wasn't a poet at all called Newman Levy. Anyone who can write a lyric like Cole Porter is in there. Would that there were such. Isn't that the Optative mood?

Less than 12 lines is too short really. More than forty is (possibly) too long. When I think aboout it, this is the definitive statement unless anyone can think of something I have left out.

I have some copies of 'Making Love to Marilyn Monroe, which is the paperback version of 'The faber Book of Blue Verse'. When I have all the Light Verses in I shall select twelve and put them up here with my comments. Then you can all vote on the winners. And the overall winner gets a Marilyn Monroe, unless he/she has already got one or doesn't want one. In which case it goes to the next person along. I like prizes.

My email server says the address is invalid. I can't make out what is meant. Are the caps CAPS?
For others, leave off the stop at the end. I knew that much.
Sign here is part of the address?
Sorry to be stupid.

I tried another running version without the hyphens (or whatever they're called) and it seemed to get through.

Janet, type "jwhitworthpoet" and then immediately after that, type an @ sign. Then immediately type "talktalk.net" No spaces, no underscores.

It's unfortunate that we can't just type the address as it should look and simply show you what's correct. But if we do that, the spambots will harvest it, and John will be flooded with even more junk e-mail than he probably already gets.

If it's still not clear, e-mail me and I'll clear it up in a private note that the bots can't see.

Thanks Maryann. I thought it was some sort of special address for this contest. All solved.
Janet

Janet, _AT_ sign means this sign @

Substitute @ (the "at sign") for _AT_ with @ in the address given. And yes, do not include the end stop.

as in: 10 boxes of red thumbtacks @ .50 box = $5.00

Sorry Janet: I didn't see that there was a page 2 , and I was replying to your post at the end of page 1. Didn't see that Maryann had already replied to you.

The above seems like massive overkill, didn't mean it that way. Sorry.

Thanks Janice. I was confused by the dashes because some people use dashes like that in their email addresses. All sorted out now.

Just as an aside, the fear of spambots is way overdone. I post my real email address all the time and the sky has not fallen. Gmail has a pretty good spam filter and I actually end up seeing very little spam, though some does slip by. I imagine that most email services have decent spam filters these days. Fear of spambots was conceived back when spam filters didn't work very well and your mailbox might be filled with 100 Viagra ads a day.

My email address is bob@bookbuzz.com -- I offer this just to put my money where my mouth is.

PS-- All email to this address gets automatically routed to my gmail.

If I may indulge in some pedantry of my own, @ is now understood as "at" but it was originally the abbreviation for "each". (That's why there's not a complete circle around the "a"--it's a vestigial "e"!)

I didn't know that about each at. I learn new things every day so now I have met my quota for today. Thanks.

There is a long entry at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_sign (where else?)

Light verse bake off
 

John,

Pardon my newness, but I'm not sure what a bake off is. Some kind of Americanism for a knockout competition? And does the sending involve ones own verse, or a chink of Ogeeden nash, for instance?
Peter Wyton

Peter, the name is jokingly stolen from the Pillsbury Bakeoff (an actual baking contest, still running as I understand), but the principle is simply that you send in your best work of the type being judged (light verse, sonnets, translations, etc.) and the screener picks a group of finalists to be posted anonymously, on the Distinguished Guest board, on the stated days.

Then the judge comments on each, and the assembled masses do too, often trying to guess whose poem each is. Finally the judge picks his or her top three and the group votes for its own favorites.

You might look at the recent Translation Bakeoff threads on the DG board to get an idea.

Peter, what you do is send me your best light verse (one) and thus enter the competition. I select what I think are the best dozen of the poems I get then post them up with my comments. Then Sphereans vote. The winner gets sweet fanny adams except on this occasion the winner gets (if he/she wants it) a copy of 'Making Love to Marilyn Monroe' which is thew paperback edition of 'The Faber Book of Blue Verse' edited by me. A great read, I tell you. The closing date is coming up nesat week so get your skates on. You can send to me direct because you already know myemail address, since we have already been in correspondence.

Many thanks to both learned advisors. Wilco.