Jiggery-Pokery Semicentennial ed. by Daniel Groves and Greg Williamson

Abstract

Reviewed by: Jiggery-Pokery Semicentennial ed. by Daniel Groves and Greg Williamson Andrew Neilson (bio) Daniel Groves and Greg Williamson, eds., Jiggery-Pokery Semicentennial (The Waywiser Press, 2016), 112 pp. Jiggery-Pokery Semicentennial is the successor to the 1967 anthology, edited by Anthony Hecht and John Hollander. Published by Atheneum, the original Jiggery Pokery collected examples of a new poetic form that made its publishing debut the previous year in Esquire magazine. Setting something of a craze for those younger poets still seduced by the pleasures of formalism, the double dactyl was devised over a long lunch at the American Academy in Rome, 1951. Attendant on the scene were Anthony Hecht, the classical scholar Paul Pascal, and Pascal's wife, Naomi. Hecht lays down the creation myth for the form: For lunch we had: antipasto, followed by lasagna, saltimbocca alla romana, insalata mista, and a bottle of good Frascati, and ending with what the Italians wittily call "English soup." I mention these things only because William Empson has recorded a conversation with T. S. Eliot in which Eliot took exception to a report of the kind of cheese he had eaten at lunch with another poet. Mock-seriousness appears to be the order of the day, although, there is more to that aside about Eliot than meets the eye—as we shall see. For now, it is time to describe the rules of the form. The introduction to the original Jiggery Pokery explains: The form itself, as it was determined that November day in Rome, is composed of two quatrains, of which the last line of the first rhymes with the last line of the second. All the lines except the rhyming ones, which are truncated, are composed of two dactylic feet. The first line of the poem must be a double dactylic nonsense line . . . The second line must be a double dactylic name. And then, somewhere in the poem, though preferably in the second stanza, and ideally in the penultimate line, there must be at least one double dactylic line which is one word long. There is yet another requirement, which we shall return to in a moment. Such is the infectious nature of the challenge, anyone encountering double dactyls may feel compelled to try their hand at one; this reviewer being no exception. So here is my attempt at a model example of the form: [End Page 293] The Long View Higgledy-Piggledy,Francis Ford CoppolaBurnished the '70sCinema set. Spielberg and Lucas wereBut his apprentices;DiachronicityKeeps them there yet. The word "diachronicity'" brings us to the additional requirement mentioned above, which Hecht and Hollander stipulate in their introduction to the original Jiggery Pokery: "once such a double dactylic word has successfully been employed in this verse form, it may never be used again" (my italics). I have no idea whether "diachronicity" meets this requirement, because as the arbiters of the form (or "Regents" as they styled themselves) go on to say: Two things follow from this. One: that there must be an approved canon of Double Dactyls by which it may be established what words have already been eliminated. Two: that presently, and probably very soon, the entire supply of double dactylic words in all languages will have been exhausted, bringing the form to its ultimate demise. Tongues firmly in cheeks, the Regents abandoned their disciples to this supposedly time-limited, but practically Sisyphean, task (see a suitable homage from the Semicentennial editors in their lengthy footnote to a poem by Adam Vines). The injunction does at least encourage the more masochistic poet to come up with as original a formulation as she can. In truth, the trickier job is to avoid repeating previous deployments of double dactylic proper names, which has a rather more pressing impact on the poem as a whole. On page 66 of the new anthology, I was not surprised to find Terese Coe also pays her dues to a certain Italian-American film director: The Godfather Bippety BoppetyFrancis Ford CoppolaBucked crazy ParamountShooting Part I: [End Page 294] Held out for Marlon, whoCharacteristicallyClobbered the Moguls andAnswered to none. Somewhere, in the sunlit halls of...