A Crazy Good Semester

OK, I wasn’t really planning to put bad writing up every day, especially with all kinds of crazy publication and contest news going on—check it out, folks, what a run y’all had this semester! Keep it coming.

And I must add, of the 300 friends, families, and colleagues I contacted for the Avon walk, far and away the most help came from you all. Maybe writing begets generosity, or it is simply that you are terrific people (you all are). Anyway, thank you. I’ll continue to post a new sonnet every day until May 2, so check out the Avon site, if you’d like.

Hey, and the Folger Shakespeare Library is throwing its Shakespeare’s Birthday Open House party tomorrow (Sunday April 26) from noon to 4 pm. It’s a kid-friendly event; I’m so there—hope to see some of you . . .

The Bard of Avon Turns 445

Happy Approximate Birthday, Shakespeare! Celebrate with a sonnet on my Avon Walk for Breast Cancer page, and read about the 1610 painting that just might be the Bard of Avon’s portrait. Or, stay here and read James Fenimore Cooper, the American author who laid the groundwork for us and . . . occasionally wrote like an 18th century British barrister.

At the sound of the tread of the noble horse ridden by the traveller, the mistress of the farm-house he was passing at the time might be seen cautiously opening the door of the building to examine the stranger; and perhaps, with an averted face, communicating the result of her observations to her husband, who, in the rear of the building, was prepared to seek, if necessary, his ordinary place of concealment in the adjacent woods. The valley was situated about mid-way in the length of the county, and was sufficiently near to both armies to make the restitution of stolen goods no uncommon occurrence in that vicinity. It is true, the same articles were not always regained; but a summary substitute was generally resorted to, in the absence of legal justice, which restored to the loser the amount of his loss, and frequently with no inconsiderable addition for the temporary use of his property. In short, the law was momentarily extinct in that particular district, and justice was administered subject to the bias of personal interests, and the passions of the strongest. —James Fenimore Cooper, The Spy (1821)

The Good, the Bad, the Iambic

This year we celebrate William Shakespeare’s 445th birthday around April 26 (no one knows for sure) and the 400th anniversary of the publication of his sonnets.

Despite this, for the next 11 days, unless stopped, this space will present very bad writing by good writers. Sacrilege! The horror! No way, Madame Bovary! How to stop it? Go here, read a Shakespearean sonnet (updated daily), and donate to the May 2-3 DC Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. (Thanks very much to those who have already given.)

You can also help by emailing (there --> or my GMU account) more examples of the worst of the best. Any bad stuff by good authors will do. Now, without further ado, here is day one (from the November 1924 issue of Der Querschnitt).

Part Two of THE SOUL OF SPAIN

You come to Spain but do not remain. Ann Veronica, Marcial Veronica, Pablo Veronica, Gitanillo Veronica. No they cannot veronica because the wind blows. The wind blows and it does not snows look at the bull with his bloody nose.
—Ernest Hemingway, 1924

Had enough already? Go here and donate.