[New-Poetry] Mad Libs

[TheOldMole]

I use Mary Oliver's wonderful essay on "Sound," where she analyzes "Stopping by Woods" on the basis of its sound values. Then sometimes I'll ask my students to destroy the poem as totally as they can, by changing just one word...and no major distorting of the meaning.


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: JforJames at aol.com 
  To: new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu 
  Sent: Tuesday, October 03, 2006 6:33 PM
  Subject: Re: [New-Poetry] Mad Libs


  I've not read this one...but 'the process' seem similar:
  In W.D. Snodgrass's De/Compositions (Graywolf, $16 paperback), the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet rewrites 101 poems – some classics, all by well-known authors – but writes them badly. In a few instances, the revisions are from the original authors. The results are slyly instructive and often funny. Mr. Snodgrass's de/compositions are an artform of a very low sort, but one that only a skilled practitioner could achieve. They retain the form of the original; still, each artless paraphrase lands on the page with a dull, leaden thud. 

  The author organizes his efforts into five sections according to the essential trait that he has squeezed out of the original: "Abstract & General vs. Concrete & Specific," "Undercurrents," "The Singular Voice," "Metrics & Music" and "Structure & Climax." These titles help, particularly with the de/compositions that you can tell are inferior to the original, but for which you cannot put your finger on exactly what is missing. If, even with these headings, the lesson is not within reach, Mr. Snodgrass has appended a brief commentary at the end of each section that helps identify the missing element from each de/composition. 

  De/Compositions is a fabulous book for poetry circles, book clubs, and anyone in search of what makes poetry special or trying to improve one's own. Mining the lessons in this book is something like the work of an accident reconstruction expert, as we learn our lessons from the details of failure, but with a sublime difference: There's a laugh on nearly every page. 

  As Mr. Snodgrass acknowledges in his preface, De/Compositions illustrates W.H. Auden's comment that there are few things funnier than bad poems.  

  From Tom Mayo, review 2002

  http://faculty.smu.edu/tmayo/poetry07apr02.htm

  In a message dated 10/3/2006 5:32:45 PM Eastern Daylight Time, wwmorgan at ilstu.edu writes:
    Here's an exercise I use in class, familiar I'm sure to many of you as
    >Mad Libs. If you'd like to tilt this whirl, or at the windmill, that
    >would be nifty; I'll post the original in a day or two.
    >
    >Exercised, as ever, and interested in what poems do --
    >AMP
    >
    >
    >________    _________
    >
    >
    >
    >December. An arctic wind, new
    >And ________ . ________ and polar bears
    >Sink into their winter ________.
    >Just then,
    >________ , in the folds of ________ snow,
    >The ________ of spring get set.
    >
    >June. In a ________ ceremony
    >Filled with ________,
    >The man is ________ at ________.
    >Just then
    >It is midnight in the ________ ________. The ________
    >Reports for duty: he recognizes the ________.
    >
    >December. Suddenly the ________
    >turns over , I ________ in a squalid
    >________, and watch, as expected,
    >Just then
    >All my stolen ________  drift by
    >Like ________  ________ .



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