language pathology 101
(h/t Tom Meadows)
stutters, aphasias, and stroke? nope:
we study what Phrygians spoke. hope
to find the cause why
and when Phrygian died
and that’s the extent of this joke’s scope.
—Andrew Lamont
What a Waist!
‘Th’expense of spirit in a waste of shame ...’—
And off goes William Shakespeare once again!
These endless hooker puns are quite malign:
Don’t let your kids read Sonnet 129.
—Seneca (Sen) Sorius
‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?’
‘No thanks, Will. And I, Anne Hathaway,
Took a restraining order out last May:
You’re meant to stay at least two miles away.’
—Anne Hathaway (not the movie star)
Problem plays, histories, tragedies;
Pastorales—don’t forget comedies!
However you classify—
And my god, the critics try—
The content remains a pure mystery.
—Miss Terry
‘My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun.’
Indeed, Will: it’s a ball of flaming gas!
So before we kick you out upon your ass
Goodbye, begad; gadzooks, God’s wounds: begone!
—Miss Tress
I can’t fully understand why
Prince Hamlet raised such hue and cry.
If a ghost from a play
Cried ‘Avenge me!’, ‘No way!
You’re a dramatic conceit!’ I’d reply.
—Toby O’Knott-Tubby
A performance of Measure for Measure
Was so good I suffered a seizure.
Now I’m brain-dead—but hey!
The thing is: the play!
I just love it when Will shakes and speares ya!
—Brian Dedd
On a read-through of Henry V
(Once I’d got past the yea-s and the sith-s)
I soon came to see
This was no history
But a trumped up and Tudory myth.
—Owain ap Maredydd ap Tudur
An Adaptation to the Cognitive Niche
There was an old linguist named Steven;
The Blank Slate he wasn’t believin’.
With a face turned much Pinker—
Having called me a stinker!—
Claimed, “Tabula rasa’s naïve, fren’!”
—α-Betty Abū Gida
In English: Nothing to be done;
Rien à faire, in the French tongue.
Hear either, you know,
En attendant Godot,
That a Beckett play has just begun.
—Sam, U. L.
