Sleuth Home - Message Boards - Message Board Game Room

Nov-6-2008 16:39

Mysteries rock, and Noir is so awesome it became its own genre. Classic. Know what else is classic? That's right, Shakespeare! Classic AND classical - he just can't be beat. Well... unless he had written Noir sonnets!!


The Premise: Here's your chance to beat Shakespeare at his own game. Take one of The Bard's sonnets, strip off all but the last word of each line, then write a new sonnet - a Sleuth sonnet!


The Rules:

* Each entry MUST be completely different from the original sonnet EXCEPT for the final word on each line.
* Each new sonnet must have a Sleuth or a Noir theme.
* You must follow the guidelines for the English Sonnet poetry form (i.e. 14 lines, iambic pentameter, rhyming scheme)
* There are a few cases in which Shakespeare did not follow the standard rules for a sonnet. If the sonnet you have chosen is one of those "irregulars", you must duplicate it (do not 'fix' it!)
* Each entry must have, after the completed new sonnet, the number of the original sonnet and a URL to link to it.
* Entries must be submitted no later than 23:59 server time on December 15, 2008.

The Links:

Here are some links to help with this contest!

http://www.shakespeares-sonnets.com/icomm.htm
http://www.everypoet.com/Archive/poetry/William_Shakespeare/william_shakespeare_contents.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iambic_pentameter


Prizes: Yay, prizes!!!

1st place: $100,000 SleuthCash (subbed) or 6 month subscription (unsubbed)
2nd place: $50,000 SleuthCash (subbed) or 3 month subscription (unsubbed)
3rd place: $10,000 SleuthCash (subbed) or 1 month subscription (unsubbed)

Dec-15-2008 23:34

Still a short amount of time left - very short. I don't really expect to see anything else, as this isn't the type of thing you throw together at the last minute, but please feel free to surprise me! :-)

A winner will be announced either Tuesday or Wednesday.

Dec-16-2008 12:11

Well, congratulations are in order! Noto just because you guys won, but because you were brave enough to enter in the first place!

I had the contest judged by an independent party who has absolutely nothing to do with Sleuth Noir and who doesn't know anyone here. I gave him the three entries - sans names, although it wouldn't have mattered anyway - and he ripped his hair out for quite a while before giving me the results.

First place goes to Secret Squirrel
Second Place to Cordelia Falco
Third place to Clint Forthwright

and a big ROFL from me for the Sonnet of Lurv to Ben... :-D

Congratulations to everyone who wrote a sonnet, and to everyone who had a chance to read them. WOW.

Dec-16-2008 14:31

Hey cool. Thanks. I still liked my Sonnet to Ben better too :) particularly topical at the moment lol. I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to finish the others I started fiddling with. The silly season really is silly.

Dec-17-2008 05:09

Congrats to SS on a very well-deserved win! And thanks to Ani for another mind-boggling competition :)

Dec-17-2008 12:40

And before I forget, I would like to send out a huge thank you to Ctown, who contributed to the prize pool by pledging the subscription!

Dec-17-2008 13:38

No need to thank me, I just enjoy reading and sometimes even playing in these things. I wihs I would have found the time to play in this one, perhaps after the holidays I'll go ahead and write one anyhow! ;-)

Congrats to all 3 of you for a job well done!

Dec-18-2008 03:28

Huge thanks to Ctown - we'll look forward to seeing your sonnet next year!

Dec-18-2008 14:49

Congratulations everyone, nice entries :)

Dec-18-2008 19:50

Fantastic job to all of you!! You all did amazing!! (And yes, I really do wish I could write that well--my record for writing terrible poetry is world-reknowned!! Writing anything, but especially poetry is much, much harder than it looks. ;-)

Thanks also to Ani for hosting this contest!! You've done wonderfully, Amie!! ;-D