What Would William Topaz McGonagall Do for Mother’s Day? You’ll Have Had Your Tay I Say
What Would William Topaz McGonagall Do for Mother’s Day?
You’ll Have Had Your Tay I Say
Reader’s of this blog will know my fondness for the doggerel of creation’s worst poet, and therefore one of its finest, William McGonagall and so I am always happy to report news of Topaz’s cunning rather than his blundering. WTM was an unemployed weaver who rose to national stardom on the back of his poem on the dreadful Tay Bridge disaster which gave rise to belly laughs and tears of hilarity, rather than tears of sadness.
Mother’s Day Sunday 26 March
Living in Dundee he had to carry one of those new-fangled umbrellas to help him avoid the rotten fruit thrown by unappreciative strangers, who almost certainly hadn’t read his lyrics. But as the new president often tries to prove – there is no such thing as bad publicity and McGonagall actually made money from his detractors. McGonagall became a poet when he lost his job in a jute mill and following a then trend he became a newspaper poet for money. It was quite the rage to write atrocious poetry so it seems and the worse the better. And that’s where McGonagall came into his own with a tremendous talent for writing the inane.
Mother’s Day Sunday 26 March
Poetry at the lower levels in Scottish was then more akin to a freak show with punters charged a penny a go to peak at the poetic dross of bad poets, no doubt each one with a health warning, ‘may affect your sense of proportion.’ And McGonagall was all for it, dressing up in a weird interpretation of Highland dress, more tartan than a biscuit tin, whilst appearing in public. Indeed William took the notion of the freak show literally and appeared at Baron Zeigler’s circus in Dundee for the then princely sum of fifteen shillings a pop.
If you haven’t sampled Topaz’s poetry try a slice here:
’Twas about seven o’clock at night,
And the wind it blew with all its might,
And the rain came pouring down,
And the dark clouds seem’d to frown,
And the Demon of the air seem’d to say-
“I’ll blow down the Bridge of Tay.”
So in the spirit of WTM here’s a go for Mother’s Day with the warning - may affect your sense of proportion.’
Between Tescos and Aldis though we may roam
Be it ever so scruffy, there's no place like home
The magic of the telly seems to follow us there
And ghostly visions are shown in repeats of St Elsewhere
Home! Home!
Sweet, sweet home!
There's no place like home
There's no place like home
Save Her The Dross
So spare your mum the dross from Kinross and take a gander at the plunder with our fine mother’s day gifts
