Funny Poet: Guy Wetmore Carryl

*** Read a funny irreverent poet from a century ago who enjoyed mocking fairy tales and dropping puns like cops drop donut holes: all over the place! He's still published and a great read.




Surreal fairy tale by jaci XIII @ flickr


From Denny: There is something fun about a writer who is both serious and funny, with a cheeky side to them. An American humorist and poet from New York City was Guy Wetmore Carryl (March 4, 1873 – April 1, 1904).

I ran across some of his poems while on the web this week, and, even though what he wrote was over a century ago, his style and his words reached across the void of Time and made me grin.

His bio is quite something as he started life off with a shout. At twenty years old he was published in The New York Times. He was graduated from Columbia University in 1895 at age 22. Only one year later he was writing for Munsey's Magazine and quickly promoted to managing editor. His next writing gig was Harper's Magazine where he shot off to live in Paris. While writing for Harper's in Paris he also wrote for notable publications like Life and Collier's. What a charmed life!

The man wrote humorous poems that were riffs off of Aesop's Fables, Mother Goose nursery rhymes and Grimm's Fairy Tales. Remember, during this time, ol' Freund was just getting geared up with the psychoanalysis genre. Until then, all society had were morality tales, myths and fantasy stories to explore the human psyche.

Carryl's writing technique was to end his humorous poems with a pun on the words used for the moral of the story. His cheeky attitude extended to his now famous epigram "It takes two bodies to make one seduction." While we all laugh at it today, his teacher, Harry Thurston Peck, was thoroughly scandalized by this "forward" remark. Don't you just love the dying embers of the Gilded Age of literature? Carryl loved to challenge the status quo and he made scandalous remarks his trademark. He was known for his outrageously ingenious rhymes and uproariously funny puns in his work. Who cares if it's great literature when you are having fun?

Carryl was a fun guy full of life. He was known for his very good looks yet good manners, his literary wit and passionate enjoyment of life well lived. Sadly, he died young at age 31, from complications of fighting his house fire a month earlier.


Read five of his funny poems playing with fairy tales:

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: How Rudeness and Kindness Were Justly Rewarded

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: How Beauty Contrived to Get Square With the Beast

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: How Little Red Riding Hood Came to Be Eaten

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: The Singular Sangfroid of Baby Bunting

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: The Embarrassing Episode of Little Miss Muffet



His works are still published and available at Amazon book store and I placed a few of his funny selections here:


Funny Poetry and Fairy Tales section of The Social Poets Amazon book store

By Guy Wetmore Carryl:

Fables for the Frivolous

Mother Goose For Grownups

Grimm Tales Made Gay (as in humorous)

Fables For The Frivolous: With Apologies To La Fontaine (1898)


His poems on the web as they are Public Domain


*** THANKS for visiting, feel welcome to drop a comment or opinion, enjoy bookmarking this post on your favorite social site, a big shout out to awesome current subscribers – and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email updates!

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: How Rudeness and Kindness Were Justly Rewarded

Leda and the swan by Mara ~ earth light ~ @ flickr


How Rudeness and Kindness Were Justly Rewarded


ONCE on a time, long years ago
(Just when I quite forget),
Two maidens lived beside the Po,
One blonde and one brunette.
The blonde one's character was mild,
From morning until night she smiled,
Whereas the one whose hair was brown
Did little else than pine and frown.
(I think one ought to draw the line
At girls who always frown and pine!)

The blonde one learned to play the harp,
Like all accomplished dames,
And trained her voice to take C sharp
As well as Emma Eames;
Made baskets out of scented grass,
And paper-weights of hammered brass,
And lots of other odds and ends
For gentleman and lady friends.
(I think it takes a deal of sense
To manufacture gifts for gents!)

The dark one wore an air of gloom,
Proclaimed the world a bore,
And took her breakfast in her room
Three mornings out of four.
With crankiness she seemed imbued,
And everything she said was rude:
She sniffed, and sneered, and, what is more,
When very much provoked, she swore!
(I think that I could never care
For any girl who'd learned to swear!)

One day the blonde was striding past
A forest, all alone,
When all at once her eyes she cast
Upon a wrinkled crone,
Who tottered near with shaking knees,
And said: "A penny, if you please!"
And you will learn with some surprise
This was a fairy in disguise!
(I think it must be hard to know
A fairy who's incognito!)

The maiden filled her trembling palms
With coinage of the realm.
The fairy said: "Take back your alms!
My heart they overwhelm.
Henceforth at every word shall slip
A pearl or ruby from your lip!"
And, when the girl got home that night, -
She found the fairy's words were right!
(I think there are not many girls
Whose words are worth their weight in pearls!)

It happened that the cross brunette,
Ten minutes later, came
Along the self-same road, and met
That bent and wrinkled dame,
Who asked her humbly for a sou.
The girl replied: "Get out with you!"
The fairy cried: "Each word you drop,
A toad from out your mouth shall hop!"
(I think that nothing incommodes
One's speech like uninvited toads!)

And so it was, the cheerful blonde
Lived on in joy and bliss,
And grew pecunious, beyond
The dreams of avarice
And to a nice young man was wed,
And I have often heard it said
No other man who ever walked
Most loved his wife when most she talked!
(I think this very fact, forsooth,
Goes far to prove I tell the truth!)

The cross brunette the fairy's joke
By hook or crook survived,
But still at every word she spoke
An ugly toad arrived,
Until at last she had to come
To feigning she was wholly dumb,
Whereat the suitors swarmed around,
And soon a wealthy mate she found.
(I think nobody ever knew
The happier husband of the two!)

The Moral of the tale is: Bah!
Nous avons change tout cela.
No clear idea I hope to strike
Of what our nicest girl is like,
But she whose best young man I am
Is not an oyster, nor a clam!



by Guy Wetmore Carryl (1873-1904)

"How Rudeness and Kindness Were Justly Rewarded" is reprinted from Grimm Tales Made Gay. Guy Wetmore Carryl. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1902.


*** Return to original post: Funny Poet: Guy Wetmore Carryl


*** THANKS for visiting, feel welcome to drop a comment or opinion, enjoy bookmarking this post on your favorite social site, a big shout out to awesome current subscribers – and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email updates!

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: How Beauty Contrived to Get Square With the Beast

Renaissance Robin Photo by Denny Lyon



How Beauty Contrived to Get Square With the Beast


MISS Guinevere Platt
Was so beautiful that
She couldn't remember the day
When one of her swains
Hadn't taken the pains
To send her a mammoth bouquet.
And the postman had found,
On the whole of his round,
That no one received such a lot
Of bulky epistles
As, waiting his whistles,
The beautiful Guinevere got!

A significant sign
That her charm was divine
Was seen in society, when
The chaperons sniffed
With their eyebrows alift:
"Whatever's got into the men?"
There was always a man
Who was holding her fan,
And twenty that danced in details,
And a couple of mourners,
Who brooded in corners,
And gnawed their mustaches and nails.

John Jeremy Platt
Wouldn't stay in the flat,
For his beautiful daughter he missed:
When he'd taken his tub,
He would hie to his club,
And dally with poker or whist.
At the end of a year
It was perfectly clear
That he'd never computed the cost,
For he hadn't a penny
To settle the many
Ten thousands of dollars he'd lost!

F. Ferdinand Fife
Was a student of life:
He was coarse, and excessively fat,
With a beard like a goat's,
But he held all the notes
Of ruined John Jeremy Platt!
With an adamant smile
That was brimming with guile,
He said: "I am took with the face
Of your beautiful daughter,
And wed me she ought ter,
To save you from utter disgrace!"

Miss Guinevere Platt
Didn't hesitate at
Her duty's imperative call.
When they looked at the bride
All the chaperons cried:
"She isn't so bad, after all!"
Of the desolate men
There were something like ten
Who took up political lives,
And the flower of the flock
Went and fell off a dock,
And the rest married hideous wives!

But the beautiful wife
Of F. Ferdinand Fife
Was the wildest that ever was known:
She'd grumble and glare,
Till the man didn't dare
To say that his soul was his own.
She sneered at his ills,
And quadrupled his bills,
And spent nearly twice what he earned;
Her husband deserted,
And frivoled, and flirted,
Till Ferdinand's reason was turned.

He repented too late,
And his terrible fate
Upon him so heavily sat,
That he swore at the day
When he sat down to play
At cards with John Jeremy Platt.
He was dead in a year,
And the fair Guinevere
In society sparkled again,
While the chaperons fluttered
Their fans, as they muttered:
"She's getting exceedingly plain!"
The Moral: Predicaments often are found
That beautiful duty is apt to get round:
But greedy extortioners better beware
For dutiful beauty is apt to get square!



by Guy Wetmore Carryl (1873-1904)

"How Beauty Contrived to Get Square With the Beast" is reprinted from Grimm Tales Made Gay. Guy Wetmore Carryl. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1902.


*** Return to original post: Funny Poet: Guy Wetmore Carryl

*** THANKS for visiting, feel welcome to drop a comment or opinion, enjoy bookmarking this post on your favorite social site, a big shout out to awesome current subscribers – and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email updates!

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: The Singular Sangfroid of Baby Bunting

Equal in stature by kevindooley @ flickr


The Singular Sangfroid of Baby Bunting


BARTHOLOMEW Benjamin Bunting
Had only three passions in life,
And one of the trio was hunting,
The others his babe and his wife.
And always, so rigid his habits,
He frolicked at home until two,
And then started hunting for rabbits,
And hunted till fall of the dew.

Belinda Bellonia Bunting,
Thus widowed for half of the day,
Her duty maternal confronting,
With baby would patiently play.
When thus was her energy wasted,
A patented food she'd dispense.
(She had bought it the day that they pasted
The posters all over her fence.)

But Bonaparte Buckingham Bunting,
The infant thus blindly adored,
Replied to her worship by grunting,
Which showed he was brutally bored.
'T was little he cared for the troubles
Of life. Like a crab on the sands,
From his sweet little mouth he blew bubbles,
And threatened the air with his hands.

Bartholomew Benjamin Bunting
One night, as his wife let him in,
Produced as the fruit of his hunting
A cottontail's velvety skin,
Which, seeing young Bonaparte wriggle,
He gave him without a demur,
And the babe with an aqueous giggle
He swallowed the whole of the fur!

Belinda Bellonia Bunting
Behaved like a consummate loon:
Her offspring in frenzy confronting
She screamed herself mottled maroon:
She felt of his vertebrae spinal,
Expecting he'd surely succomb,
And gave him one vigorous, final,
Hard prod in the pit of his tum.

But Bonaparte Buckingham Bunting,
At first but a trifle perplexed,
By a change in his manner of grunting
Soon showed he was horribly vexed.
He displayed not a sign of repentance
But spoke, in a dignified tone,
The only consecutive sentence
He uttered. 'T was: "Lemme alone."

The Moral: The parent that uses
Precaution his folly regrets:
An infant gets all that he chooses,
An infant chews all that he gets.
And colics? He constantly has 'em
So long as his food is the best,
But he'll swallow with never a spasm
What ostriches couldn't digest.


by Guy Wetmore Carryl (1873-1904)

"The Singular Sangfroid of Baby Bunting" is reprinted from A Nonsense Anthology. Ed. Carolyn Wells. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1915


*** Return to original post: Funny Poet: Guy Wetmore Carryl


*** THANKS for visiting, feel welcome to drop a comment or opinion, enjoy bookmarking this post on your favorite social site, a big shout out to awesome current subscribers – and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email updates!

Funny Poem Fairy Tale: How Little Red Riding Hood Came to Be Eaten

Little Red Riding Hood by Krystn Palmer Photography @ flickr




How Little Red Riding Hood Came to Be Eaten


MOST worthy of praise
Were the virtuous ways
Of Little Red Riding Hood's Ma,
And no one was ever
More cautious and clever
Than Little Red Riding Hood's Pa.
They never mislead,
For they meant what they said,
And would frequently say what they meant:
And the way she should go
They were careful to show,
And the way that they showed her, she went.
For obedience she was effusively thanked,
And for anything else she was carefully spanked.

It thus isn't strange
That Red Riding Hood's range
Of virtues so steadily grew,
That soon she was prizes
Of different sizes,
And golden encomiums, too!
As a general rule
She was head of her school,
And at six was so notably smart
That they gave her a cheque
For reciting, "The Wreck
of the Hesperus," wholly by heart!
And you all will applaud her the more, I am sure,
When I add that this money she gave to the poor.

At eleven this lass
Had a Sunday-school class,
At twelve wrote a volume of verse,
At thirteen was yearning
For glory, and learning
To be a professional nurse.
To a glorious height
The young paragon might
Have grown, if not nipped in the bud,
But the following year
Struck her smiling career
With a dull and a sickening thud!
(I have shed a great tear at the thought of her pain,
And must copy my manuscript over again!)

Not dreaming of harm
One day on her arm
A basket she hung. It was filled
With jellies, and ices,
And gruel, and spices,
And chicken-legs, carefully grilled,
And a savory stew,
And a novel or two
She'd persuaded a neighbor to loan,
And a hot-water can,
And a Japanese fan,
And a bottle of eau-de-cologne,
And the rest of the things that your family fill
Your room with, whenever you chance to be ill!

She expected to find
Her decrepit but kind
Old Grandmother waiting her call,
But the visage that met her
Completely upset her:
It wasn't familiar at all!
With a whitening cheek
She started to speak,
But her peril she instantly saw: --
Her Grandma had fled,
And she'd tackled instead
Four merciless Paws and a Maw!
When the neighbors came running, the wolf to subdue,
He was licking his chops, (and Red Riding Hood's, too!)

At this terrible tale
Some readers will pale,
And others with horror grow dumb,
And yet it was better,
I fear, he should get her:
Just think what she might have become!
For an infant so keen
Might in future have been
A woman of awful renown,
Who carried on fights
For her feminine rights
As the Mare of an Arkansas town.
She might have continued the crime of her 'teens,
And come to write verse for the Big Magazines!

The Moral: There's nothing much glummer
Than children whose talents appall:
One much prefers those who are dumber,
But as for the paragons small,
If a swallow cannot make a summer
It can bring on a summary fall!


by Guy Wetmore Carryl (1873-1904)

"How Little Red Riding Hood Came to Be Eaten" is reprinted from Grimm Tales Made Gay. Guy Wetmore Carryl. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1902.


*** Return to original post: Funny Poet: Guy Wetmore Carryl


*** THANKS for visiting, feel welcome to drop a comment or opinion, enjoy bookmarking this post on your favorite social site, a big shout out to awesome current subscribers – and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email updates!