Talk:Double dactyl

Not vandalism
The second line of the Dick van Dyke poem has to be "Penis van Lesbian." That's what scans, and what sets up the humor. My changing it back after an anon changed it to "Dick van Dyke" was reverted as vandalism.

This does raise the issue that the poem is, indeed, obscene (inasmuch as "penis" and "lesbian" are obscene words). There are plenty of fine examples we could offer, so there's not a lot of benefit in offering an obscene one. If I have any further trouble with that one I plan to replace it. LW izard @ 02:42, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

I removed it. It doesn't scan as a double dactyl. And who is Brian Flannagan? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.163.106.71 (talk) 14:59, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Links inside poems
Whilst I recognize the mad wiki craze to link every single bloody noun, verb, and concept, in an article, don't editors think that the resulting formatting chaos rather detracts from the verse? Greglocock (talk) 11:52, 8 June 2009 (UTC)


 * No, I think it aids understanding quite a bit. Without them I'd be like "'Nicomedophily' -- huh, weird word.  Oh and look, Google shows its only use in this exact poem.  Guess I don't get this one."  Whereas with the link I hover over it quickly to see what it links to and am like "I see what you did there."  LW izard  @ 05:44, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Then put a glossary underneath. Greglocock (talk) 06:00, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * That rather defeats the point of hyperlinks, where the word in question can act perfectly well as the link! I'm not sure what you mean by "formatting chaos" - it doesn't mess up the formatting at all on my screen, merely shows the word in blue as an indicator that I can click on it if I wish. 143.252.80.100 (talk) 15:22, 26 June 2009 (UTC)


 * IF the CREATORS of those POEMS had WANTED to USE Fonts and colour as PART of the POEM then they WOULD HAVE INCLUDed them. They DIDN't. Greglocock (talk) 02:51, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Piet Hein example
I have removed the quoted poem by Piet Hein, which has only the meter and rhyme scheme of a double dactyl:
 * 1) The first stanza doesn't include a double-dactylic name.
 * 2) The name it does use isn't in line 2.
 * 3) The second stanza doesn't contain a double-dactylic word.

A mathematical example by Piet Hein, dedicated to Martin Gardner.


 * Parallelism


 * ''"Lines that are parallel
 * ''Meet at infinity!"
 * ''Euclid repeatedly,
 * ''Heatedly, urged


 * ''Until he died, and so
 * ''Reached that vicinity:
 * ''In it he found that the
 * ''Damned things diverged.

--Thnidu (talk) 02:39, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Tagging double-dactyl names and words
In the examples, I've tagged the double-dactylic name that refers to the subject of each poem with a single asterisk, and the double-dactylic word in the second half with two asterisks, with matching tags in the description of the form. It's noteable that
 * the Jaksch example seems to cheat with "Gay Caius Julius" for the name, where apparently only "Caius Julius" is the name. But "gay" here can be seen as a short form of "Gaius", which is itself an alternate form of "Caius", and therefore a kind of punning nickname in English for "C/Gaius Julius".
 * the Gaiman example doesn't actually have a double-dactyl name
 * the Bellairs example has two (but the second one doesn't affect the form)

--Thnidu (talk) 05:33, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

I've parenthesized the asterisks on the "cheaters" and added a note. --Thnidu (talk) 16:15, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

One sentence?
This site, which seems to be pretty careful, says the whole poem should consist of a single sentence. Anyone able to check Hecht & Hollander? --Thnidu (talk) 19:21, 4 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I checked Hecht and Hollander, and no, there is no requirement that the poem consist of a single sentence. In fact, many of the double dactyls from that book consist of two or more sentences.  I have updated the article to correct a few other mistakes relating to the history and form of double dactyls.  (For example, regarding the single double-dactyl word which every poem must contain, Hecht and Hollander say only that it is preferable, not that it is required, for it to appear in the second stanza.  Also, I don't see any claim in the book that the form was invented in 1961; it says it was invented in the afternoon of 3 November 1951.) —Psychonaut (talk) 10:25, 13 March 2014 (UTC)
 * And to quell any doubt, here is the full description of the form from Hecht and Hollander:
 * The form itself, as it was determined that November day in Rome, is composed of two quatrains, of which the last line of the first rhymes with the last line of the second. All the lines except the rhyming ones, which are truncated, are composed of two dactylic feet.  The first line of the poem must be a double dactylic nonsense line, like "Higgledy-piggledy," or "Pocketa-pocketa" (this last, of course, borrowed from The Secret Life of Walter Mitty).  The second line must be a double dactylic name. And then, somewhere in the poem, though preferably in the second stanza, and ideally in the antepenultimate line, there must be at least one double dactylic line which is one word long. (Foreign languages may be employed, and indeed there is a hope that this form will restore macaronic verse to the dignity it has not enjoyed since the Late Middle Ages.) But, and the beauty of the form consists chiefly in this, once such a double dactylic word has successfully been employed in this verse form, it may never be used again.
 * —Psychonaut (talk) 10:16, 15 March 2014 (UTC)