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Group Writing: A Merry Note
‘When all around the wind doth blow // And coughing drowns the parson’s saw // And birds sit brooding in the snow // […] // Then nightly sings the staring owl, // Tu-whit; // Tu-who, a merry note,’ – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost.
Having found a bit of honest culture, whilst rummaging through the index of a book to find something to fit March’s ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ theme for group writing, I now face the problem of what to do with it: Do I just let it sit there raising the tone of things, or do I try to wander sidewise into some apropos topic of the day?
Better not, perhaps; it’s as well for a man to know his limits.
Mayhap instead I could leave you with another bit of the Bard’s? Wordsworth is traditionally supposed to be the one for daffodils, but to paraphrase P. G. Wodehouse, I see no reason why Shakespeare shouldn’t have a look-in as well. So, let us speak a moment of
‘Daffodils // That come before the swallow dares, and take // The winds of March with beauty’ (The Winter’s Tale)—
—No, no, wait, let’s not leave it quite there. W. S. Gilbert has something to say here, too:
‘The flowers that bloom in the spring, // Tra la, // Breathe promise of merry sunshine’,
for, let it not be forgotten after all,
‘Every journey has an end – // When at the worst affairs will mend – // Dark the dawn when day is nigh – // Hustle your horse and don’t say die!’[1]
Cue the music, maestro!
[1] Iolanthe, just if you’re interested.
[2] Finale from Gilbert and Sulivan’s The Mikado, as performed in Mike Leigh’s Topsy Turvy.
Published in Group Writing
Love it.
Thank you very much.
Sideways is the best direction in which to wander.
After all, you wind up in such interesting places.
A man’s got to know his limitations. I believe that was Shakespeare’s Dirty Harry who said that.
Well played, indeed!
We do need a few more members, with or without name, to join in our Group Writing Series under the March 2021 theme: “Blowin’ in the Wind.”
Spring into action and sign up today!
There are two major monthly Group Writing projects. One is the Quote of the Day project, now managed by @she. This is the other project, in which Ricochet members claim one day of the coming month to write on a proposed theme. This is an easy way to expose your writing to a general audience, with a bit of accountability and topical guidance to encourage writing for its own sake.
Interested in Group Writing topics that came before? See the handy compendium of monthly themes. Check out links in the Group Writing Group. You can also join the group to get a notification when a new monthly theme is posted.
I didn’t know you’d read Henry V (ye Unedited Verfion) . . .
(I feel bound to say, though, that Terry Pratchett got there long before me, not just with the Dirty Harry jokes (especially in his City Watch books), but with this sort of joke in general.)
Also known as Hank the Cinq.
Ah, it’s all been downhill since Arthur’s day. (Er, or so I hear.)
Short and sweet! Excellent! Here are some daffs to go with it.
Arr, thankee kindly. Brightens the place up a treat.
While greasy Jill doth keel the pot.
Some things don’t change: sooner or later, someone ends up doing the washing up?