Ever had a MC write a poem?

Pamster · Nov 25, 2007

Just curious, I had mine write one in my first novel and I think it went over well enough. Just curious as to whether others have done this as well.

donroc · Nov 25, 2007

Yes, because in my historical, the MC is described by contemporaries as a gifted poet. However, none of his poems are extant. So, I created several.

It helps that I had written poems and won awards for them as well.

www.donaldmichaelplatt.com

Hillary · Nov 25, 2007

My mother has poetry in her debut novel. Unrelated to this thread, sorta, but I was actually curious how they handled copyrights for publication because my mum's friend from a writing colony is the poetic voice of the girl in the book... Hrm... I think it works really beautifully for the book, but who knows about the legality. It's not like Shana appears as an author or anything. Maybe Shana just did it for fun? Now I'm all curious. I need to find out.

MOOOOOOOOOOOTHER! ANSWER THE PHOOOOOOOOOOONE!

ishtar'sgate · Nov 25, 2007

Yes, I had a poem in my historical. A secondary character quoted a chant I made up about Stonehenge and its use.
Linnea

maestrowork · Nov 25, 2007

Yes. The protagonist is a wannabe writer. So even if my readers find the poem "bad" I have an excuse.

KTC · Nov 25, 2007

Actually, I've had characters write poems/songs, etc. My last novel featured a famous folksinger. But I would NEVER put the poem/song into the book. I say how good the poem/song is...I don't want to put something in at that point that isn't good. It has to be universally good...so I just talk ABOUT said song/poem. I wouldn't want my reader to stop and say..."REALLY? BECAUSE I THOUGHT IT WAS CRAP." So...I have done it, but I would never include the piece in the novel.

bluemoonscribe · Nov 25, 2007

Yeah, but my MC wrote it in fifth grade. It was called "Grandpa's in an Urn" and it got her a lot of time in the guidance office.

JBI · Nov 25, 2007

I have plenty recite poetry in their stream of consciousness, yet if I include a poem the character has written, I never put the whole thing in one burst, and always commentate on it.

In the post-modern movement, and now the post-post-modern movement, obscure mixes of style are common. Large parts of books like Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow are written in verse.

A More interesting take on this is Nabokov's Pale Fire, which is written as a commentary on a 999 line poem, analyzing the poem compared to the life of the author, and the commentator.

NicoleMD · Nov 25, 2007

I just finished reading a book where the MC wrote poetry and would delete it afterwards. Kinda fun. I wrote song lyrics once, and that was sort of liberating.

Nicole

Zelenka · Nov 25, 2007

In my historical fantasy, the First Minister writes poetry that everyone says is 'lovely' whilst secretly cringing. That was fun though, as in the book he was meant to be copying Robert Burns and writing in Ayrshire dialect. I had a character once, a secondary MC, wrote a play / musical to try and impress the woman he fancied (Voyager may remember The Most Lamentable Comedy of Belenwen and Bawabor), all in really awful verse. I don't think I've ever written any serious poetry within a novel though.

ishtar'sgate · Nov 25, 2007

KTC said:
But I would NEVER put the poem/song into the book. I wouldn't want my reader to stop and say..."REALLY? BECAUSE I THOUGHT IT WAS CRAP." So...I have done it, but I would never include the piece in the novel.

Guess I didn't think that far ahead. It was just fun to do. If readers think my poem is crap then they probably think my writing is crap, too.

Linnea

Little Red Barn · Nov 25, 2007

I wrote a poem in my memoir--it ties in, however, I guess it will be up to a publisher as to whether I keep... so far agent likes it, kept it in during edits, we'll see.

Chasing the Horizon · Nov 25, 2007

I have two poems in my second novel. One is directly attributed to my hero, the other is on the page dividing part one from part two and doesn't specify who supposedly wrote it. Whether the reader thinks they're 'good' or not is irrelevant. The hero isn't a professional writer and I make no statements as to how good or bad he is at it.

Nateskate · Nov 25, 2007

Pamster said:
Just curious, I had mine write one in my first novel and I think it went over well enough. Just curious as to whether others have done this as well.

I'm editing an Epic Fantasy. In the first drafts I wanted to avoid the Tolkien "Songs/Poems" thing. It's not that I didn't love Tolkien, but at times I felt that distracted from the pace of the stories. I'd find myself wanting to skip them.

Instead of doing typical poems, I took a different more, "Double Double, toil and trouble" kind of approach, putting curses into the mouths of some of the evil creatures in the story.

I actually wanted the curses to be sing-song in form. I figure if it has that nursery rhyme quality it will flow better.

Voyager · Nov 25, 2007

JessRamage said:
(Voyager may remember The Most Lamentable Comedy of Belenwen and Bawabor)

It's burned in my brain for all eternity. I miss Bawab the Builder. *sigh*

Zelenka · Nov 25, 2007

Voyager said:
It's burned in my brain for all eternity. I miss Bawab the Builder. *sigh*

Ah good. I always feel if I've caused ingrained trauma in my readers, then my work is done...

Pamster · Nov 27, 2007

Thanks for the great answers everyone! I feel much better about my little poem my MC writes in my first novel now.

illiterwrite · Nov 27, 2007

I had one in my last book, but it was meant to be a bad poem. Since I'm not a poet, I can't imagine trying to write a good one for a novel.

Conman · Nov 27, 2007

None of my characters have ever written poems (I don't think they were really the writing type) but I did include a short poem in my WIP, and it was rather important to the plot.

TheIT · Nov 27, 2007

I'm writing fantasy, and one of my secondary characters is a bard who has written a ballad about one of my MCs and one of the pivotal events of his life (which is a loose summary of what happens in book one). The song has caused my MC a world of trouble because of the numerous parodies. My MC is rather embarassed by the whole thing, but can't stop the song from being sung, and it's useful for some plot points.

I'm not a musician, so I've never tried to write the song or the lyrics. All I know is that it's got a bouncy dance tune and lots of verses.

Stew21 · Nov 27, 2007

Battling writer's block, mid novel. I was trying to get back into my character. So I wrote a poem about what I thought he would write.
here is it.
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63770

It won't go in the book, I've decided. Not his style (the novel is in first person).

So it was just a writing exercise for my character profile instead.

leenakincaid · Nov 29, 2007

Pamster said:
Just curious, I had mine write one in my first novel and I think it went over well enough. Just curious as to whether others have done this as well.

Yes, and secondary characters have as well.

reenkam · Nov 29, 2007

One of my MCs wrote a couple poems. And they were actually pretty good. I don't even feel weird saying that because I don't feel like I wrote them. I'm terrible at poetry, but those couple actually had some merit, apparently.

Now my issue is that I need more, but I'm not in that character's mindset anymore so they're just not turning out to be very good.

Prawn · Nov 29, 2007

> Ever had a MC write a poem?

Once. He was a man from Nantuckett.

aruna · Nov 29, 2007

Yes. I have an uncle who writes poems. I asked him to write poems for a character of mine in Peacocks Dancing. I told him what the poems were supposed to be about and he did it. I gave him a thank you in the acknowledgements.

Ever had a MC write a poem?

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