In Competition No. 3042, a challenge inspired by the American parodist Frank Jacobs’s 1975 version of ‘Jabberwocky’, ‘As If Lewis Carroll Were a Hollywood Press Agent in the Thirties’, you were invited to provide a Hollywood–themed ‘Jabberwocky’ for our times. Jacobs begins: ‘’Twas Bogart and the Franchot Tones/ Did Greer and Garson in the Wayne;/ All Muni were the Lewis Stones,/And Rooneyed with Fontaine…’, and most (though not all) of you closely followed that template — to dazzling effect. Honourable mentions go to Rob Johnston and Joe Houlihan. Those printed below pocket £25 each.
’Twas Downey, and the Harrelsons
Did Cruise and Walken in the Pitt.
All Spacey were the Sarandons,
And Nicholsons half-lit.
‘Beware the Streepymeryl thing,
The wanxome Caine, the gribbled Crowe.
And never be caught Willising
The frungible Paltrow!
Beware the stribulous Dafoe,
The Damon frimbling in his Cage,
The hot Roth of DiCaprio
And Hoffman’s puglish rage!’
The sad youth heard the smurbly words
That named his mortal mission thus.
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