Monday 8 December 2008

A sonnet for the New Year

Last year the OMF sonnet-writing competition generated world-wide excitement (well, five people entered); there is a report on it here, together with a link to all the entries.

We are fast approaching the season when post-prandial torpor afflicts many and there are long periods during which eructation is the only physical activity that can be undertaken, so a new competition is launched today which may keep a few minds alive. Well, actually, it's not a competition this time; all entries which comply with the conditions will be published and I will send a cheque to the Save the Children Fund for five pounds for each accepted entry, excluding the really rotten ones.

The rules are the same as last year except that there is a new set of line-endings:
might sway sight day
ill deeds skill exceeds
more hate abhor state
me thee

Closing date is 1st January 2009.
At 11th December, four entries have already been received

All entries will be published on 8th January.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello,

I recently came across your blog (via a search for 'literate blogs'), and find it greatly inspiring. Your posts are great encouragement to read more and sharpen my writing skills.
I hope I'm not taking any liberties by adding you to my blogroll first....?
Best wishes.

Anonymous said...

Dear Anu
I am greatly honoured that you have added OMF to your blogroll. I would add your blog to my roll but I don't have one; However, I have subscribed to your RSS feed so that I can follow all your writing.
Every good wish

Anonymous said...

Ave Tony,
I was in Reginald's in Frith Street the other night (you know, the one under the bank with the old Arabian prints and they serve Burgundy but only in pewter) and the fellows were wondering out loud whether you had a sonnet bash on this year-end. I told them you had and what's more I'd noted the line endings. So in the end they all threw in a line each and below is the result. A bit like that old parlour game Consequences.
It's not vintage, being a bit of a Frankensonnet but not a bad effort, I thought. One new chap, balding, aquiline features, ruff about his neck and looked about 400 years old, threw in one of the lines saying he'd already used it somewhere else but was happy to lend. Decent, I thought, though it wasn't as good as my line (line 11, neologism-ho!).
Save the Children, that's what I say.

Anonymous said...

Thank you, Grumio. I have deleted from your message the very creditable entry by you and the lads from Reginald's, and will publish it with the others on January 8th.

Meanwhile, my seasonal greetings to you all; broach ye a butt of Malmsey in my name.

Anonymous said...

Aye and right merrily and a gallon of sack scoured from a wench's purse shall traffic our weary throats!

Or a Grey Goose & tonic.