AUG 30, singable satire, the modern Hamlet monologue "THE PLAY'S A STING"

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 30 in previous years ...

2020: patients and maladies, prostatic hypertrophy, BPH (illustrated poem)
2021: amphibians, Kermit's reincarnation (illustrated poem) 
2022: singable satire, F.O.P.-shop Wine (parody lyrics)
2023: singable satire, Funniversary Song (parody lyrics)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... Funniversary Song), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 30, 2024): 

PARODY-LYRICS
ORIGINAL SONG: "The Major General's Song" from Gilbert and Sullivan's "Pirates of Penzance". 
LYRICS: modified from W. Shakespeare "Hamlet (Prince of Denmark)"; the soliloquy "O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I"
Notes to the Lyrics: The lines sung by MG Stanley and by the Chorus generally exhibit the 3-syllable rhyming which has come to characterize the original and parodies of the "Major General's Song". In the present circumstance, neither the MG or I was able to convince the Prince of Denmark to use a rhyming convention adopted by British naval officers several centuries later; his lines here have only single-syllable rhyming, and are therfore similar to Tom Lehrer's accessible version used in the song "The Elements" .

Parody Composed: Giorgio Coniglio, April 2013, a sequel to the song, "Modern Major General" posted HERE in May 2014.   

THE PLAY'S A STING

(to the tune of "TheMajor-General's Song") 

(Maj. Gen. Stanley)

   

As proudly demonstrated in my proof-of-concept parody*,

 Iambic harmonizing with Will Shakespeare’s lines has meritry

For modern adaptations, costumed uniformly or bespoke,

And at your local bar for Open-Mike or tokey karaok’.

To cite just one example from a spectacle eponymous,

Protagonizing recitation of his pond’rings ominous   

Gives Hamlet back-row status, when upstaged by old Polonius 

Who’s scatting catchy melodies by Brubeck and Thelonious.

(Hamlet)

So now I am alone. O what a rogue and peasant slave I am !

Is it not monstrous that this player here got Heckie in a jam ?

He feigns tears in his eyes, a broken voice and passioned sympathy,       

Full-knowing that she’s going to pursue him for paternity.

Yet I, unpregnant of my cause, a muddy-mettled rascal, peak,

And I say nothing when my throat is burned or when my nose is tweaked;    
Amazed indeed the very faculties of Eyes and ENT –   

I protest not defeat of most dear life and royal property.

 I, prompted to revenge with both the motive and my passion’s cues

 Should far out-kvetch the actor cleaving ears with his Hecuba-blues,

 And so I fall a-cursing, but keep watch for ghost-like devils loose – 

Unpack my heart with words about the square of the hypotenuse !

I’ve heard that guilty creatures sitting at a play have been soul-struck 

By very cunning scenes, so un-tongued malefactions get unstuck;

I’ll have these players voice their prose and check after the mustering

If Claudius should leave to pee on viewing bros’ ghost-bustering.

(Chorus)

Ear-poison rerun in our skit might irritate a kingly snit:

The play’s a sting wherein we’ll finger Claudius the Illegit.

(MajGen Stanley)

                                        

The seating for such theatre-shorts, and photo-ops we should confirm,

With front-row tickets organized by Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

With such a crazy family I’ll have grounds more relative than bunk;

The play’s the thing wherein I’ll catch the conscience of my sleazy Unc.

(Chorus)

Ear-poison rerun in our skit might irritate a kingly snit:

The play’s a sting wherein we’ll finger Claudius the Illegit.

(MajGen Stanley)

 Let Branagh vocalize whole-hog, in digital or analog, 

My Sing-Along Soliloquy’s the Modern Hamlet Monologue. 

(Chorus)

We've kissed the lips of Prince and Frog **, and now it's posted on a blog,    

"O! What a peasant slave and rogue..."  -  the Modern Hamlet Monologue.

* The Modern Hamlet Monologue, posted on this site May 2014.

**A planned but unproduced episode of the Muppet Show was entitled “Kermit, Prince of Denmark”.

 

AUG 29, postal places, USA: Duluth, MN

 a) Reprise of material posted on August 29 in previous years ...

2020: magical canal palindromes, A man ... Paris. (wordplay)
2021: insects, Ricardo the dragonfly (illustrated poem) 
2022: exotic destination, Mt Pleasant, SC (photo-collage)
2023: defining opinion, envision (poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... envision), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 29, 2024): 

 

Authors' Note: MN is the official abbreviation for the American state of Minnesota, in which Duluth, a town with population 90,000 is situated. At the western end of lake Superior, the town was transiently, at the beginning of the 1900s, the busiest port in the United States.

The town's unusual name derives from the area's first known European explorer, the French soldier Daniel Greysolon, Sieur du Lhut. Duluth is now home to the annual "Magic Smelt Parade" and the University of Minnesota Duluth. Despite the region's French connection, the largest immigrant group in Minnesota has hailed from Scandinavia, accounting for the Swedish name of the verse's protagonist.

"Telephone-booth stuffing" was a short-lived global craze among college-age kids in the 1950s. Of interest, in the UK the activity was known as "telephone-booth squash", and the "rules" required that a phone-call be made from the overcrowded booth.

  At one swell foop, you can review all our postal poems about intriguing places in the USA and Canada, by proceeding to the encyclopedic blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE !

AUG 28, OEDILFian limericks: haiku poetry 1

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 28 in previous years ...

2020: new world palindromes, 33 (wordplay)
2021: culinary verse, zucchini/courgettes (illustrated poem) 
2022: saving the planet, summer air quality (poem)
2023: lexicon of word-pairs, duplications U to Z (wordplay)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... duplication U to Z), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 28, 2024):  

 

AUG 27, flying back east

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 27 in previous years ...

2020: classic palindrome, Zeus sees Suez. (illustrated poem)
2021: scopes of medicine, mediastinoscopy (poem) 
2022: organic brain poetry, frontal meningioma (poem)
2023: lexicon of word-pairs, duplication Si- to T (wordplay)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... mediastinoscopy), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 27, 2024): 

 Above the Canadian portion of the planet (photos by Giorgio Coniglio) ...

(dated Aug 25)

safety information in French and English, coast to coast

taking off from Nanaimo, British Columbia;
 very short flight to YVR (Vancouver)

rolling into Vancouver

starting out from YVR
across the Fraser River

icefields of the Rocky Mountains

flying over the foothills/prairies,
just east of the Rocky peaks

descending to the airport in Calgary, Alberta

next morning's descent;
 the final flight terminates in Toronto

AUG 26, photo-collage: sunny afternoon at the Duck Ponds, High Park, Toronto

 a) Reprise of material posted on August 26 in previous years ...

2020: insects, gnat repellents (poem)
2021: anagram swarm, Canadian scramble-towns 1 (wordplay maps) 
2022: American satire, taking the fifth (illustrated poem)

2023: painterly poetry, Auvers-sur-Oise (illustrated poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... gnat repellents), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 26, 2024): 

 A sunny afternoon at the Duck Ponds, Toronto's High Park, as photographed using his i-phone 13, by Giorgio Coniglio... 

(dated Aug 27,2024)

 

view of photographic apparatus
(see the detailed description)

To discover Giorgio's illustrated poem about great egrets, click HERE (Nov 24, 2023), and for other photo-shoots highlighting these  photogenic birds, in various venues around the continent, click HERE (Apr 18, 2024), HERE (Sep 19, 2023), HERE (May 20, 2022)  and HERE (May 10, 2022). 

wood ducks, females

To see Giorgio's illustrated poem about wood ducks, click HERE.

 

AUG 25, Submitted Palindromes: RANDOM PILE #23

a) Reprise of material posted on August 25 in previous years ...

2020: waterfowl, laughing gulls (illustrated poem)
2021: poets' corner, free verse (poem)
2022: duplication, fuddle-duddle (illustrated poem)
2023: submitted palindromes, targeted, Dennis sinned (wordplay)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... free verse), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 25, 2024): 

   On the 25th of each month you will find a slide-filling group of palindromic phrases submitted to the editors by a panel of 7 palindromists. These folks have all been working on this project since January 2020. Their profiles are indicated in panels published here at the start of things, and then, we have asked them to provide (palindromically, of course) their views on one of the iconic items in the classic literature, starting with "A man, a plan, a canal -- Panama", and continuing with other well-known phrases, such as "Dennis sinned". Otherwise, their contribution will be grouped in random piles (a phrase that you might recognize as an anagram of the word p-a-l-i-n-d-r-o-m-e-s).

AUG 24, Olympic sport: long jump

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 24 in previous years ...

2020: American satire, miscellany (poems, various)
2021: oncologic verse, Pat's adenoma (poem) 
2022: patients and maladies, intermittent claudication (poem)
2023: mythed opportunities, Pandora's box (poem)

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b) Today's Offering (Aug 24, 2024): 

 

track and field, long jump

AUG 23, Olympic sport: fencing

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 23 in previous years ...

2020: limerick variations, embedded illustrations (illustrated poem)
2021: limerick variation, C-rhyme extension (illustrated poem) 
2022: Canadiana, compassionate use (poem)
2023: scopes of medicine, endoscopic collage (selected poems)

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b) Today's Offering (Aug 23, 2024): 

Olympic sport

fencing

AUG 22, planet-saving verse: enzootic viral ending

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 22 in previous years ...

2020: Toronto ravines, lower Don valley (photo-collage)
2021: Panama palindrome parody, A dog, ... a pagoda. (wordplay) 
2022: funny bones, olecranon (elbow) fracture (illustrated poem)
2023: patients and maladies, ganglion cyst (poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... ganglion cyst), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 22, 2024): 

 

Authors' Note:  Having suffered the ravages of Covid-19, has humanity's ability to cope with outbreaks of infectious disease improved? Not too much. This pessimistic verse was written after seeing a TV documentary revealing updates on what we have learned about the potential threats of further epidemics. 

You can help save the planet by viewing all our verses in this series at "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE!

AUG 21, photo-collage: Long Lake, Nanaimo, BC

  a) Reprise of material posted on August 21 in previous years ...

2020: Greek prefixes, apo- (illustrated poem) 
2021: anagram swarm, US scramble-towns, finale (wordplay maps)

2022: classic palindrome, Dogma, I am God! (poem)
2023: terminal exclamation, YIPPEE! (poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... finale), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Aug 21, 2024): 

  Photos obtained by Giorgio Coniglio, and edited on his i-phone 13 ...