Observed by sun and star : An Archie sonnet and its story.

[nodbear]

Yes !Just when you thought you were safe for ever from attacks of Archie's versifying he is back.The return of Archie's sonnets has been in contemplation for a long while but events have conspired - however he is back now with a sonnet inspired by his lieutenant's exam of all things

Comments

[ext_245474]

:D Whoever actually wrote that sonnet is a far better poet than I could ever be. The precise nature of that particular form is not an easy one to master.

(Quite appropriately, I finished this morning reading Steven Taylor's Commander, his biography of Sir Edward Pellew. Definitely an inspirational chap - one can only wonder how he managed to find room on his quarterdeck for all his young gentlemen, of whom Hornblower and Kennedy were surely among the brightest stars.)

[nodbear]

The precise nature of that particular form is not an easy one to master.

It is a case of letting the metre ad scansion become subconscious mind rather than a conscious battle I think, like when learning to drive a car .Then you 'only' have the rhyme and the sense to worry about at any one time !

anyway Archie thanks you kindly ;)

and yes Taylor's book is excellent - finally a biography much nearer the real man than the previous attempts.

[nodbear]

The seacoast of Bohemia seemed very Archie somehow !

Glad you liked the sonnet !

[eglantine_br]

I don't think you can know how astonishing your poems are to me.

I tried years ago to write sonnets. They were terrible. I could adhere to the form and end up with a pretty rhythm, or I could have meaning. Getting both together was like trying to get a cat into a small bathing suit!

And the fact that you are writing it in Archie's voice, and that Archie's voice feels just the same to the bones of my spine--

I like the idea of Archie, on his own, being judged and found worthy. Worthy, not in the eyes of those who love and know him best, who knew anyway, but in the eyes of the examininers. I would trust my frigate to Archie any day!

[nodbear]

*gulps* what kind and lovely things to say - thank you !

I find the sonnets come 'relatively ' naturally to me- at least the rhythm does and I try to think the rest through from as Archie a perspective as is possible:)
As I have said before sonnets and other verse forms are the only way I can write disciplined stuff - which is why I am so in awe of what you achieve in a few hundred words only

But you are right that meaning can get dissolved in the struggle for a rhyme - I usually find that if I am really struggling for word rhymes it means going back to the beginning of the quatrain at least and thinking how can I say the same thing in an entirely different set of words :) just altering the bit that rhymes doesn't work.
and if you have a good word which has hardly any words rhyming with it then stick it in the middle of the line
and fiddle with the word order :)

and I agree wholeheartedly about Archie being found competent = he would of course be an excellent lieutenant candidate - a true Indefatigable in the end :)

[mylodon]

Aw. Just aw. so lovely. Thank you for the continued versifying.

[nodbear]

Thank you for the awww !

Archie has several more on the stocks which he may get on to when he finishes having Horatio 'help him revise';)

[mylodon]

LOL That makes me think of how cats 'help you' by sitting on your pages or poking your pen.

[nodbear]

LOL

Yes they so do that !Anteros reported yesterday that one of the kittens was sleeping under the lap top stand while she worked :)

I imagine Horatio's help might well be more in the category of the warm sleeping presence as much as the testing on navigation ;)
btw Keep meaning to find your post again and reply - yes I love the pre 6 nations videos :) And I think the Sam warburton moment in it is my favourite part in the wales one

[anteros_lmc]

Awww it's been too long since Archie put pen to paper. I've been saving this until I could give it the time and space it deserved and it was well worth the wait. There is such a wonderful evocative lyricism to those lines isn't there? Especially knowing how much it must have meant to those young men (and of course they are ours ;)

take Mr Warden with you - he knows exactly where to go and the most pleasant route.”
Who could be a better guide?! I wonder if he also knows his way to the Opera...

Archie has excelled himself. I love that second line, though the final couplet just makes me melt.

PS. I hope there will be a follow up fic about the forging of Mr Kennedy's certification of birth and baptism ;)

[nodbear]

they are ours indeed :)

Yes I think Archie maybe inspired by those solemn words some more before too long

and I will see what I can do in the way of falsifying age fic ....* thinks *