My sense is that the limerick is a primarily literary form (in its conception), but one that often relies on performance (or, at the very the least, the idea of performance) in order to realize fully its effect. But, is it a full blown oral poetic system with all that entails? I don’t think that’s the case either. But, is that the same as an author? Of course it’s not. If we were to think about the author of such poems, we would no doubt think first and foremost about a tradition. Why? Is it simply because such poems deal with low themes? Is it because these little poems act more like jokes than poetry? I’m sure our lack of concern about the authorship of such pieces is motivated by both issues, but, that does not mean authorship of such poems is an uncomplicated matter. Harry Rusche (English Department, Emory University) and his students.I think we all know where this is going, but, does anyone know who wrote it? Is there even a concept of author that could be reasonably applied to such doggerel? The question doesn’t usually enter our minds. Punch promptly shut down the contest, the fad died out, but the limerick lived on forever (Legman viii-x).īeckson, Karl. Throughout the 1860's, Punch continued to publish clean limericks until the inevitable "bawdyĪnd sacrilegious" (Legman x) entries were submitted by anonymous pranksters. The English humor magazine Punch, inspired by Lear's book, began to publicize the "new" form within its pages, and thus began the limerick craze. The reprinting of Edward Lear's Book of Nonsense in 1863 inadvertently created the English limerick fad. Surprisingly, a volume of clean-not bawdy-limericks was responsible for the form's current popularity. Ry-in short satirical efforts of elaborate rhyme, in which, be it said once and for all, woman is the usual butt of the satire" (Legman xl). Often the joke is on the poet himself the limerick is a method, sometimes hostile, of laughing away "sexual fears and impotencies-real and imagina Or of the sexual impulse: its organ-inferiorities, its attitudes, and misadventures" (Legman xxxix). Most are about "the unconscious or unwilling hum This sense of fun that pervades the limerick has made it the perfect outlet for humorous and folk poetry, especially drinking songs. T of Shakespeare to compose a limerick, but merely a sense of humor. Its indecency can be explained by its sheer simplicity one does not need the talen The limerick, has been and probably always will be "an indecent verse-form" (Legman vii). Don Marquis defines three distinct types of limericks: "Limericks to be told when ladies are present limericks to be tolĭ when ladies are absent but clergymen are present-and LIMERICKS" (Legman xi). Given its dubious scholarly or aristocratic beginnings, the somewhat indecent and obscene nature of the limerick is understandable. Ral of his plays, King Lear and Othello (Legman xxii). Despite its popularity in pubs and taverns, formal poets were familiar with the limerick Shakespeare employed the form in seve N the refrain "Will you come up to Limerick," a now-forgotten tavern chorus from the Irish town of the same name (Legman xix). The term limerick itself has its apocryphal origins i Of the English language, from the bellowing songs of half-naked street beggars during the sixteenth century to the drinking songs of inebriated pub-crawlers in the seventeenth century (Legman xv-xix). Since then, the form has appeared sporadically throughout the history Variants of this form dating as far back as the fourteenth century are found in English nursery rhymes and animal-warning poems such as "The lion is wondirliche strong" (Legman xiv). The following example fairly represents the genre in both style and tone: Third and fourth lines are printed as a single line with internal rhyme (Beckson 144). The first, second, and fifth lines are trimeter, while the third and fourth are dimeter. It consists of five anapestic lines with the rhyme scheme aabba. The simplicity of the limerick quite possibly accounts for its extreme longevity. It has refused-and still refuses-to die, despite its curious role as the "vehicle of cultivated, if unrepressed, sexual humor in the English lan The limerick, bawdy and obnoxious, is not unlike a freak-show curiosity in the carnival of literary forms. "There Once Was a Man From Nantucket": The Limerick
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