And of course there's the poet of that name. If anybody's wondering, HaSS in
my username stands for the school of Humanities and Social Sciences, which
is not quite like belonging to the Department of Everything, but well on the
way.
I agree with you about form - rhyme in particular can force you off into new
directions - and intend to argue this in my discussion with David Kennedy at
our forthcoming conference. But we've opened this can of worms before, and
they take a lot of putting back.
Best wishes
Matthew
-----Original Message-----
From: William Herbert [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 03 April 2000 13:33
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Verse Forms (oops)
Dear Matthew,
You might like to know that there is a Scots expression (not, I think, still
current), 'pap o the hass', which refers to the uvula. 'Hass' being the
neck, or the gullet, and 'pap' being the nipple. I've felt for some time it
ought to be at least a greeting ('Pap o the hass to you!') or, at best, a
toast ('Stin igia sas!' 'Na zdarove!' 'Slainge!' 'Pap o the hass!'
I'm writing a lot of narrative in the older verse forms at the moment, hence
the need to do my scales at every opportunity. Perhaps the book I'm working
on would benefit from a series of short 'explanations' of the verse forms it
employs, as appendices. In which case I'd stuff this extra stanza in as its
new penultimate one:
It maks ye rax for far mair rhymes
at a faster pace than the sad hauf-mimes
o normal formal verse: its chimes
can syncopate;
it's bagpipe ragtime, bop's sublime
Scots drinkin mate.
Which sentiment is probably limping along long after and far below the Auden
line that's at the front of Brodsky's essays:
"Blessed be all metrical rules that forbid automatic responses,
force us to have second thoughts, free from the fetters of Self."
It's a take on the predictability of form argument that's sometimes
overlooked.
Best,
Bill
-----Original Message-----
From: Francis M (HaSS) <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 03 April 2000 11:10
Subject: RE: Verse Forms (oops)
>Don't worry, it happens all the time, particularly with the irritating
>format our system here uses for names - I'm surprised people don't address
>me as (Hass). I'd just emailed our system manager to ask if there was any
>way I could change my user name (or the way it appears on emails), but he
>said it had to be that way round so the address book could be in surname
>order. Your verse history is a tour de force - it only seemed to take you
>about an hour. You ought to publish it.
>
>And yes that would be my brother - Richard Francis is not quite such a
>reversible name but it does get him mixed up with the horsey thriller
writer
>Dick. At one time he put an imaginary H in the middle, like the S. in Harry
>S. Truman.
>
>Best wishes
>
>Matthew Francis
>[mailto:[log in to unmask]
>01443 482856
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: William Herbert [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>Sent: 31 March 2000 17:26
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Verse Forms (oops)
>
>
>Herbert Bill would sorry say like to
>reminding him of Yoda still are you.
>Brother your he even knows thinks he
>Manchester from h.D. examined P
>Writing Creative Lancaster at
>feeling Bill is Herbert like a prat.
>Pixies The lead singer from the swopped
>his what names round, and that's now dropped
>at me in mess look you askance is:
>Apologies to Matthew Francis.
>
>
>
>Dear Matthew,
>
>Here comes the bauld stanzaic lore
>that maks aa modernistics snore:
>a man caad Sempill fur a splore
> wrote 'Habbie Simson',
>a piper's elegy -- and more:
> oor bards saw crimson.
>
>(That's bagpipes, by the wailin way --
>whit is a tonedeef boy tae say?)
>It's hauf-lament and hauf in play
> that gees the twist:
>a fact that in his morbid lay
> auld Wordsworth missed.
>
>But Allan Ramsay and young Rab
>(Rab Fergusson) jist hud tae grab
>it fur the Scots Revival. Rab
> (that's Burns -- keep up!)
>wha paid fur Fergusson's grave slab
> wiz jist a pup.
>
>"The Daft Days", "Caller Oysters", "To
>the Tron-Kirk Bell" showed whit tae do:
>Burns took the habbie til a new
> heicht wi the likes
>o his addresses tae a crew
> o subtle tykes.
>
>The Deil, a moose, a daisy, drink;
>the haggis (whit wid veggies think?);
>there's Death and Dr Hornbook's jinks
> and Holy Willie;
>a louse, his mare, his mates, mair drink,
> and bein silly.
>
>
>The habbie sometimes taks Burns' name
>because ut's apt fur Burns-like games
>but, Matthew, it wad be a shame
> if that wiz aa:
>the fitbaa needs nae player's fame,
> sae pass the baa!
>
>Best second go,
>
>Bill
>
>
>***************************
>Bill Herbert
>[log in to unmask]
>[log in to unmask]
>http://www.trace.ntu.ac.uk/poets/Herbert/lobsters.htm
>
>
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