Fun Holiday – Clerihew Day

Commemorating Bentley’s birthday the unofficial holiday encourages people to read and write their own specific form of clerihews.

A clerihew is a 4-line biographical poem usually featuring and making fun of a well-known person. The first line always includes the name of the subject. The poem does not have a fixed meter or line length and has an AABB rhyme scheme.

Anatomy of a Poem

In poetry, a meter (or metre if you follow British spellings) refers to a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line that is set in length (a verse). A rhyme scheme refers to the pattern of rhymes at the end of each line in a poem. To identify a rhyme scheme, each line in a poem is designated with a letter. Lines that share a letter rhyme have words at the end that rhyme with each other.

It is believed that Bentley first came up with the clerihew at the age of 16 during a science class. The poem was about Sir Humphry Davy, a chemist. It was published in 1905.

How to Celebrate?

• Read some of Bentley’s clerihews.
• Spend some time coming up with your own clerihews. What about featuring some of your friends, family members, and co-workers in some of your poems?
• Learn more about the history, art, and science of poetry.

Did You Know...

...that the study of meter and rhyme in poetry and prose is called prosody?