The Eye-Rhyme Clerihew

Competitors were invited, for a prize of £5, to submit sets of three clerihews whose rhymes are eye-rhymes and whose subjects are any writers, "ging or dead. For example: The late W. T. Stead Loathed mead And almost never drank claret In a cabaret.

The very voluminous response to this competition proves that the scope of the eye-rhyme clerihew (a variation which I invented some fifteen years ago) is almost as wide as that of the orthodox type. Its defect is, of course, that it is for the eye only. Few competitors seem to have found the idea difficult, although there were some who failed to produce good clerihews, perhaps because they made the mistake of thinking the form too easy. Clerihews, in my view, must be concise (no elephantine last line), written in straightforward English without inversions; and they are all the better for having some connection, however tenuous, with the real life or character of their subject.

After weighing the merits of some 500 clerihews, I have isolated four winning sets, and suggest awards of £2 to R. S. Stanier, and £1 each to E. W. Fordham, Pibwob and R. Kennard Davis.

PRIZES (R. S. STANIER) Thucydides Seldom laughed till he split his sides, And was thus one of the banes Of Aristophancs.

It was no use addressing Dante By the poste restante; He kept going from place to place Allegro vivace.

Many of the best remarks of Goethe

Have sunk in Lethc;

For instance: he once told Heine

To go and jump in the Seine.

(E. W. EORDHAM) John Keats

Having been ploughed in Greats Wore a black chemise Till his demise.

Thucydides Drowned three of his brides: He was an unpredictable cove When in love.

Sir Edmund Gosse Was arrested by a posse Of remarkably nice Police. (einwoo) John Keats Entered caveats Against the threats 01 W. B. Yeats.

When Professor Joad Went abroad The natives guessed from his mien That he was an alien.

Daniel Defoe Got a pebble in his shoe; He said, 'Open, Sesame!'

And out it came.

(R. KENNARD DAVIS) When John Keati Got ploughed in Greats,

t He downed three quick champagnes

And wrote 'The Eve of St. Agnes.'

Euripides Was strong on forsaken brides, But his real panache Was Andromache.

Henry James Murmured '0, Mesdames!' COMMENDED

(ALMA MARSJI) Francois de Sales

Avoided Wales: II a dit : 'J'adore Paris, Mais je deteste Beaumaris.'

(JOY R. GRANT) 'Hand me,' said Dante, The plume de ma tante- I've thought of something nice About Beatrice.'