Ok, that settles it--and thanks very much, Dave! But I was just kidding about the double play--the reason I know about bowler's and batsmen and hat tricks (oh my) is that I once had to copyedit a long essay on cricket and English literature, the first page of which made it clear that I'd better understand the game if I didn't want to mess up the essay. As for "Then" at the beginning of the last stanza, I think you're right, and I was uncomfortable with it too. But since Johnson's poem starts off its last stanza with it ("Then with no throbbing fiery pain"--yuck, huh?), presumably for a downbeat-dirgey effect following from "Though now his eightieth year was nigh," I thought it might be important to keep it for the sake of the parody. Maybe it's just too awful, though. (Jeez, I thought "The Vanity of Hatrack Wishes" was bad until I discovered "On the Death of Dr Robert Levet"!) Thanks again--Candice P.S. Yup, Richard seems to have put a Sirius hex on that demon. on 1/5/02 1:02 PM, david.bircumshaw at [log in to unmask] wrote: >> Would "His hat trick's pure >> cricket" work for you (i.e., to force the stress back on "hat")? > > I like that, Candice. It slows down the predominant swing and pushes the > voice onto the forefronted sounds. But one has to be careful of breaking up > the rhythm. Definitely not 'IMpure' cricket (there are no double plays in > that game: silly mid-oafs, I mean 'offs', long legs, googlies and yorkers, > but if a batsman hits the ball twice at his stumps - the wicket's the > 'pitch' where the ball is bowled btw - then technically he's out) > > Perhaps the first line of the final stanza needs to start with an unstressed > syllable, I find hitting the brakes on 'Then' at the start of a stanza a > little forced, as further lines begin with a 'hit', maybe something like > 'And then' twould be easier to hit the second word. This would have the > benefit of pushing a stronger emphasis onto 'Death' at the inception of the > following line. Then!!! > > The demon has e-vanished from me, I'm glad to say. > > > Best > > Dave > > > David Bircumshaw > > Leicester, England > > Home Page > > A Chide's Alphabet > > Painting Without Numbers > > www.paintstuff.20m.com/index.htm > > http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/index.htm > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Candice Ward" <[log in to unmask]> > To: <[log in to unmask]> > Sent: Saturday, January 05, 2002 5:28 PM > Subject: Re: Guardian: The canonic dead in a noel coward raw > > >> Oh, I see what you're getting at, Dave--thanks. Now, I'm wondering how the >> line would be read in the wild, that is, where the stress would fall for >> most people on the first reading among the 3 possibilities you note. Maybe > I >> should try to control for that, but I'm reluctant to get too finicky with > it >> and risk getting stuck in my own wicket. Would "His hat trick's pure >> cricket" work for you (i.e., to force the stress back on "hat")? Or how >> about "His hat trick was IMpure cricket" for a double play (if cricket has >> those)? Appreciate your advice, being rather metrically challenged >> myself--Candice >> >> P.S. Feel free to back-channel me if you're worried about the Temple > Demon!