2008 BIRTHDAY CHALLENGE

Each year we provide an essay topic in a special birthday edition of the Muse which is distributed at both New York dinners and posted on the ASH website.

The Assignment:

Write a Sherlockian haiku. Entries should follow the typical American 17-syllable, 3-line structure: five syllables in the first and third lines and seven syllables in the second. Only one haiku can win.

Birthday Challenge Winner

As expected, this Challenge was hard to judge. All the entries were interesting, probably because the form is so restricted. As contestant Brad Keefauver put it: “The haiku is like a little verbal callistenic for working the word-muscles in your head.”

For our one winner, we chose Warren Randall’s linkage of the steps of 221b and the haiku:

The stairs are averse
So I climb them in good form.
Five, Seven and Five!

Congratulations, Warren!

Runners-Up

Here are some more who shared in the fun (in no special order).

Brad Keefauver “raped” a tale

Dig Saxe-Coburg Square!
Beat the pavement with your stick!
It’s all hollow, man!

Dorothy Belle Pollack offered a mini-mystery:

Lachine and the tale
Of David and Bathsheba.
But what happened there?

Jeff Bradway added a critical note:

Scarier than Hell,
The Hound of the Baskervilles:
Hard to show in film.

Michael Pollak worried about the landlady:

Is Mrs. Hudson
The sad reason for the lock
On the Tantalus?

Chrys Kegley considered Holmes’ image:

Sherlock wore a hat,
A funny two-brimmed cloth cap.
Thanks, Sidney Paget.

Sandy Kozinn reflected on The Master’s skills:

Trouble comes in mist
Blurred like fog through a window.
Holmes can see clearly.

Dana Richards admonished:

If it should strike you
I am over-confident
Whisper “Norbury.”

Peter Crupe summed up the January Weekend:

Birthday greetings to
Master of 2-2-1-b,
Many more to come.