Parodies of
Edgar Alan Poe
by Don L. F. Nilsen, and
Alleen Pace Nilsen
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PARODIES OF EDGAR ALAN POE’S “BELLS”
Hear the sledges with the bells—
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody
foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the Icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
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Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so
musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling
of the bells.
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II: Hear the mellow wedding bells
Golden bells!
III: Hear the loud alarum bells
Brazen bells?
IV: Hear the tolling of the bells—
Iron bells!
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• Thus, the poem takes us from the
merry silver bells to the harmonious
wedding bells to the clamorous alarum
bells and finally to the solemn death
nell of the iron bells.
• Until we come to the final line in the
poem:
To the moaning and the groaning of the
bells.
• (Hart 70, 661-663)
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DEMER CAPE’S PARODY OF “BELLS”
See the doctors with their pills—
Silver-coated pills.
What a world of misery their calomel
instills.
How they twingle, twingle, twingle in
the icy-golden night.
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You have taken two that mingle.
And you wish you’d had a single;
While your cheeks are ashy white…
Oh, the pills, pills, pills—
Pills, pills, ,pills, pills.
So ends my rhyming and my chiming on
the pills.
• (Falk 112)
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BARRY PAIN’S PARODY OF “BELLS”
Here’s a mellow cup of tea, golden tea!
What a world of rapturous thought its
fragrance brings to me!
Oh, from out the silver cells
How it wells!
How it smells!
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Keeping tune, tune, tune
To the tintinnabulation of the spoon
And the kettle on the fire
Boils its spout off with desire,
…
But he always came home to tea, tea,
tea
tea, tea, tea, tea.
(Wells 362, MacDonald 323, Falk 111)
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ANONYMOUS’ PARODY OF “BELLS”
Hear the fluter with his flute,
Silver flute!
Oh, what a world of wailing is awakened by its
toot!
How it demi-semi quavers
On the maddened air of night!
And defieth all endeavors
To escape the sound or sight
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Of the flute, flute, flute,
With its tootle, tootle, toot…
Of the flute, flewt, fluit, floot, Phlute,
Phlewt, Phlewght,
And the tootle, tootle, tooting of its
toot.
(Wells 140-141, MacDonald 103)
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C. F. LUMIS’ PARODY OF “ANNABEL LEE”
It was many and many a year ago,
On an island near the sea,
That a maiden lived whom you mightn’t
know
By the name of Cannibelee;
And this maiden, she lived with no other
thought
Than a passionate fondness for me.
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• The poem continues by developing the
nature of this fondness by Cannibelee,
and it ends,
With a love that could take me roast or fried
Or raw, as the case might be.
Hood names his parody poem, “A Poe-’em
of Passion”
• (Falk 121)
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THOMAS HOOD JR.’S PARODY OF
“ANNABEL LEE”
It was many and many a year ago
In a District called E.C.,
That a Monster dwelt whom I came to know
By the name of Cannibel Flea,
And the brute was possessed with no other
thought
Than to live—and to live on me!
(Falk 121)
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BARBARA ANGELL’S “ULABEL
LUME”
I was a child and she was a child
And childishly childlike we’d romp.
But we loved with a lovlier love than love
In this old barge on the swamp.
With a love that made the winged seraphs in
heaven
Foam at the mouth and stomp.
(Falk 121)
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C. L. EDSON’S “RAVEN’S OF
PIUTE POET POE”
Once upon a midnight dreary, eerie, scary,
I was wary, I was weary, full of worry,
Thinking of my lost Lenore.
Of my cheery, airy, faery, fiery Dearie—
(Nothing more).
(Falk 114)
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HOLLY CHIVERS’ “HUMPTYDUMPTY: A LA POE”
As an egg, when broken, never
Can be mended but must ever
Be the same crushed egg forever—
So shall this dark heart of mine
Which, though broken, is still breaking,
And shall nevermore cease aching
For the sleep which has no waking—
For the sleep which now is thine.
(Falk 114)
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• Chivers’ parody of Poe’s “The
Raven” is very dark. He wrote it
when Poe died, and the death in the
poem refers both to the death of Poe,
and the death of his lover, whose
name was Isadore.
• For Chivers felt that Poe had stolen
his own poem, entitled, “Isadore.”
• Chivers’ original poem read as
follows:
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While the world lay round me sleeping
I alone for Isadore
Patient Vigils lonely keeping,
Someone said to me while weeping:
“Why this grief forever more?”
And I answered: “I am weeping
for my blessed Isadore.
(Falk 113)
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NOW BACK TO CHIVERS’ PARODY
As an egg, when broken, never
Can be mended but must ever
Be the same crushed egg forever—
So shall this dark heart of mine
Which, though broken, is still breaking,
And shall nevermore cease aching
For the sleep which has no waking—
For the sleep which now is thine.
(Falk 114)
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• Did Poe steal Chivers’
poem?
• You be the judge.
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Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Allan_Poe
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