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Edmund Clerihew Bently 
Created Philip Trent. He 
Also defined the norm 
For his eponymous poetic form. 

 

Father Brown 
Gained wide renown. 
Not for prayerbooks or hyminals, 
But for collaring criminals. 

 

The clerihew is a four-line poem with a rhyming scheme of AABB. The first line traditionally is, or ends in, a person's name; the meter is often mangled, if not ignored altogether; and the overall intent of the poem stresses entertainment over instruction, humor over fact. 

The term "clerihew" comes from Edmund Clerihew Bentley, who wrote the first known clerihew as a schoolboy. He went on to produce, under the name E. Clerihew B.A. (and with a little help from schoolmate G. K. Chesterton) a collection of clerihews called Biography for Beginners (1905). Bentley is also known for his groundbreaking mystery novel, Trent's Last Case (1911), which helped make plot and character as important as the puzzle in English detective fiction. 

Agatha Christie 
Wrote plot lines so twisty, 
Whodunit we'd never know 
If it weren't for the little grey cells of Poirot. 

 

A mystery clerihew is a clerihew whose subject is a writer of or character from mystery fiction. 

 Mystery clerihews usually have titles, which isn't a common feature of clerihews in general. (See if you can match the following titles with the clerihews on this page: "Dying to... Zings!," "L of a Book," "A Literary Legacy," "The Op's Pop's the Tops," "The Roamin' Detective," "A Tale of Two Proclivities," "What a Dame.") 

Dashiell Hammett 
Wrote like dammit. 
For a time he was a little too much on the Red side 
To keep one of his books by your bedside. 

 

There is at least one paying market for mystery clerihews. Several of the clerihews on this page and on the mystery doggerel server have been published in Murderous Intent Mystery Magazine. 

Sue Grafton 
Knows her craft, and 
She gets better 
With each letter. 

 

A "cleriview" is a clerihew that is also a book review. For the advanced reader, a "mystery cleriview" is a clerihew that is also a review of a mystery book. 

 At present, this writer knows of only two mystery cleriviews, the above (for Sue Grafton's L is for Lawless) and the below (for Margaret Chittenden's Dyng to Sing): 

Margaret Chittendon 
Shows us her wit, and then 
Procedes to regale 
Us with a fine tale. 

 

Dorothy L. Sayers, 
For translating prayers 
From Italian? Can't beat her. 
(Still, I'd like more Lord Peter.) 

Here are some other on-line references to clerihews. Who says the Web has no content? 

The finest clerihew page I've seen 

Did you know that J.R.R. Tolkien was a clerihewer? 

Jane Austen, immortalized at last (by G.K. Chesterton) 

They even appear in Star Trek parodies