h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: How to write good poetry? - A793497
Author: TheMyriadWhoIsALordOfTheRingsFanatic - U191081

I can't use the Guide ML so I don't think my entry qualifies.

Actually, you don't need to know GuideML to get into the Guide, though it certainly does help. Try instead just writing your headers in CAPS or otherwise emphasising them...

I am not unhappy with this entry.
Not much nitpicking to be done with it.
It is an honest effort.

I like this; it seems like solid, down-to-earth advice to do 'exactly what it says on the tin.'

When you see a title like this, you sometimes think 'Oh dear, here we go,' but this was a pleasant surprise. I don't know if I'll be freeing up any drawer space with this in mind in the near future, but i think if i *were* considering writing poetry, this would not be far from the way I'd probably work it.

A 'wait and see' approach combined with moments of ruthless culling...

I like it.

Just one comment springs to mind; on the subject of the subject, as it were. Perhaps 'Advice on getting started writing poetry' or something prettier to similar effect. See what I'm getting at. Your entry is not so much a guide to how to produce 'good poetry' (whatever that is) but rather advice to someone who thinks they might like to try their hand but can't see how to get started.

Whaddaya say?

seeya
spiff

"The Modest Person's Guide to Bearable Versification"?

"Suggestions on how you might decorate a piece of paper"?

"I've done it and now you can, too. Poetry for the cautious."?

"You, TOO, Can Do Poetry! No, it is not recipe for cooking a horror writer. It is a way of freeing your soul from prose. No, prose is not what a runaway model does. No, a model is not one of those plastic things that looks like an auto, that you put together with airplane glue. No, Airplanes are no longer put together with glue, but council houses are. No, no one on the council actually lives in the houses. They just design them for the tenants, much like a fish-owner picks out the castle for the fishbowl. Except fish don't pay rent. Unless you eat their young. Which can get expensive if you keep koi. No, a koi fish does not bat it's eyelashes. Fish don't have eyelashes."?

Thanks for that spiffing advice.

I believe that your suggestion is covered in the question mark at the end of "How to write good poetry?". However, any advice or suggestions are always welcomed. I'm just glad I'm not being ignored!

Cheers,

Myriad.

Very nice. I like your open frankness; this is oft difficult to find or to say; most esspecially on a topic such as this. You trully do "Tell it like it is".

Perhaps (and this is just perhaps) you can work on another way to do it; one for the ones who are impatient (such as myself. I write my poems in a few minutes. If their no good; tuff; that's the way they are staying).

All in all, I give you accolades.

Is it worse to be ignored, or to be paid attention to by the ignorant?

Hello,

I am afraid impatience has no place in any writer's character. Impatience produces terrible poetry. I know - I have been there and done it.

My method works for me - I cannot envisage using any other method as I am just relieved to have found one that works for me. I make no claims about the method working for other people but if a person is struggling to express themselves poetically this method MAY offer a solution.

The crib sheet part was dispensed with by myself after about 3 years. I can now, through practice, conjure up all the relevant words in my mind which speeds up the whole writing process.

But the 3 or 4 months in the drawer is absolutely essential. I have found, through experience, that I immediately love some of the poetry I write but after 3 or 4 months wait then find out it is pure dross. It's better that the author finds this out first rather than immediately showing someone their poem only to be embarrased by the negative reaction. Control the poetry yourself - better in the long run.

Cheers,

Myriad.

Is there a method
to the madness?
The separating
the person from
the badness
of their rambling
iameter?
Is every
versification
due to be
subjected
to perusification
by every Tom,
Dick and Harriet?
Or are some
solemn sonnets
to be held
close to the vest
and protected
from the poetic
farriet?
Good or bad,
the action of
putting pen to
papier,
is, even at
the worst of
times,
a way of propping
up the
superiority
of the pencil
over the rapier!
So, when you clutch
your tablet of clay
tight (but not
too tight) in hand,
and take up pointed
stick to cuneiform
to your heart's
demand,
damn the torpedoes
and inscribe full
speed ahead,
because the day
will come
when you can't
write,
because you
are
dead!

Revenge! Tonsil!

cool little examplia gratis from the fastest quill in the West!

I love it! ta muchly!

now run along and put it in the drawer where it belongs!

As they say in all the worst comedies -

'I'm joking, of course.'

!! (didn't think there were quite enough excl marks in this post)

spiff

Fair enough and I do indeed see your point better now. Perhaps this is why I am so unsuccessful.

I am quite tempted to nick this, and add to it.

First off, let me say that this is a very good entry. As Spiff said, it does what it says on the tin.

Secondly, this is nothing like the way that I write poetry.

How do I write poetry?

Simple

Step one: Fall deeply in love. (Deeply in lust will do at a pinch, but deeply in love is better). This can be with your cat, or a landscape, or your five year old daughter, or a man. It is most effective if it is with a man. Nothing will twist in your heart and betray you like your love for a man. Except a cat, that is.

Step two: Have good times.

Step three: Have bad times.

Step four: Brood. Have sleepless nights. (Like this one). Drink; (absinthe makes the heart grow fonder). Lie awake looking at the different colours of grey the world takes on at 3.00 in the morning.

Step five: Play with words and sentances in your mind when you are walking. Wander distractedly round supermarkets like the daft-biddy who lives down the street. Be unable to settle to anything. The effect you are aiming for is a sort of mental indigestion; you can concentrate on nothing but the rumbles in the back of your mind, but they are in the back of your mind, and you cannot actually get at them. The more this becomes a physical sensation, the better the poem will be.

Step six: Wake up, completely distracted one morning, with the compulsion to splatter the contents of your mind onto paper. It helps if you are crying while you do this. You can do it sitting in a car outside the house you shared with your ex, for added piquancy. If you really want to f**k with a man's brains, get up all distracted one morning, refuse to talk to the man whose bed you are getting out of, (this is simplest if he is too sleepy to handle the situation) and then sit down in the kitchen and write a poem *about someone else*. This only works if the poem that you write is really really good.

Step seven: Read the thing out loud at every available opportunity, both to yourself and to other people. This is when you discover that not only was it mental effluence, it is literary effluence too. But at least you learn which words and lines are redundant, and where the rhythm falters and flags.

Step eight: (Only do this if you are prepared for the consequences; though the sense of power may make it well worthwhile). Show it to the bastard who inspired it, and watch him edge away in nervous fear.

Ben

Thanks for the kind words.


Myriad.

Sorry about that. I was drunk at the time. Your method is actually much better than mine, and considerably more workmanlike.

Cheers

B

Ben, you'll be pleased to hear that your method works as well for prose as poetry. I've used the techniques you describe for many years to great effect. Ecxept for the bit about men. And step eight.

Mmmm, oddly enough, it works for scripts as well. Maybe especially so. Nothing like writing all those conversations you'll never get to have.

Fatty

Or shouldn't have....

Hi Myriad, are you still around?

Just in case Myriad isn't I'll ask fellow AWWers do you think this is in the right place? To me it has more the air of Writing Workshop with a view to Peer Review.

Not sure how 'how to' guides go down over there.

Any thoughts?
Speckly