[1323] Strugnell's Sonnets (VI)

Let me not to the marriage of true swine
Admit impediments. With his big car
He's won your heart, and you have punctured mine.
I have no spare; henceforth I'll bear the scar.
Since women are not worth the booze you buy them
I dedicate myself to Higher Things.
If men deride and sneer, I shall defy them
And soar above Tulse Hill on poet's wings --
A brother to the thrush in Brockwell Park,
Whose song, though sometimes drowned by rock guitars,
Outlives their din. One day I'll make my mark,
Although I'm not from Ulster or from Mars,
And when I'm published in some classy mag
You'll rue the day you scarpered in his Jag.

	-- Wendy Cope

 From "Making Cocoa for Kingsley Amis", published 1986.
 Attributed by Ms Cope to Jason Strugnell, the somewhat impressionable
but always enthusiastic Bard of Tulse Hill.

 Being a good poet is hard enough; being a good _bad_ poet is (dare I
say it) even harder. Wendy Cope's creation, the irrepressible Jason
Strugnell, can be tiresome sometimes, but by and large his 'work' is
marvellously funny. Like William McGonagall or Julia Moore, he remains
blithely unaware of his shortcomings; it's his utter lack of
self-consciousness that makes him so memorable.

 Strugnell's intolerable egotism, his unrelieved seriousness, and his
laughably narrow horizons all make him the perfect tump (Cope's acronym
for "typically useless male poet"). In presenting her (fictitious)
protagonist, Cope makes some serious points about the qualities (and
flaws) of the latter group. But Strugnell is not merely a figure of
ridicule. He's certainly funny, but in his shallow, self-centred way,
he's also somewhat sad. He may not be very likable, but he remains
pitiable nonetheless.

thomas.

[Minstrels Links]

More from the irrepressible Strugnell:
Poem #587, Strugnell's Rubaiyat
Poem #693, Strugnell's Haiku

Non-Strugnell Cope poems:
Poem #859, Waste Land Limericks
Poem #859, An Unusual Cat-Poem

And Bill Shakespeare's original:
Poem #363, Let me not to the marriage of true minds (Sonnet CXVI)

[Other Links]

Here's a very nice article on Ms Cope and her poetry:
http://books.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4193029,00.html

Here's an essay on Wendy Cope and the weight of light verse:
http://www.n2hos.com/acm/rev1299a.html

Both are well worth a read, do take a look.

[this poem is archived, accessible and awaiting your comments at]
http://www.cs.rice.edu/~ssiyer/minstrels/poems/1323.html
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