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Tech term for unfinished rhyme

21 Feb 08 - 10:08 AM (#2268534)
Subject: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

Can someone remind me of the technical term (I am sure I have seen one) for the sort of verse where you expect a rhyme, usually saucy, but get a different word instead

Some examples:

1. (Handy Household Help)
It removes the stains from fabrics
and the blemishes from glass
It keeps your TV free from static
and will fumigate your ...attic

2. Kid's rhyme

Follow your kids to school
Hit them with a stick
Instead of learning their abc
They're fiddling with their ...Private
Seargeant major, had a dog called Horrocks...

3. Old grey beard (trad)

Me mother she told me to give him a glass
Hey, ho I won't have him
I gave him a glass and he fell on his head
And his old grey beard kept wagging


I am sure you have got the idea by now.

21 Feb 08 - 10:12 AM (#2268537)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

The question was actually triggered by finding this example of the style:

Old woman of Rumford

21 Feb 08 - 10:17 AM (#2268546)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Dave Hanson

As I was walking past Saint Pauls,
A dog ran out and bit my leg.

An unfinished rhyme is a rhym

eric

21 Feb 08 - 10:19 AM (#2268548)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Peace

You can rent rhyms like that--unfinished, that is.

21 Feb 08 - 10:26 AM (#2268552)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

Eric, I think you mean this one:

As I was walking by St Pauls
A lady grabbed me by the elbow

She says you look a man of luck
Do come in and have some tea

It's only sixpence or a bob
It all depends on the size of your cup

A perfect example!

21 Feb 08 - 01:05 PM (#2268689)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Snuffy

Cosher Bailey's brother Matthew
Had a job at cleaning statues
But when cleaning one of Venus
He did slip and break his .... elbow.

Cosher Bailey's brother Billy
He played soccer for Caerphilly
Ah, but when he took up rugger
He looked such a silly .... billy.

etc., etc., ad nauseam

21 Feb 08 - 01:31 PM (#2268707)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Little Robyn

There was a song on the radio back in the 60s like that. Not sure how much I remember.......
    There once was a farmer who took a young miss
    In back of the barn where he gave her a
    Lecture on horses and chickens and eggs
    And told her that she had such beautiful
    Manners that suited a girl of her charms,
    A girl that he wanted to take in his
    Washing and ironing and then if she did,
    They could get married and raise lots of
    Sweet violets,
    Sweeter than the roses
    Covered all over from head to toe,
    Covered all over with sweet violets.
Sweet violets, yes, that's it. It might even be here already.
Robyn

21 Feb 08 - 01:32 PM (#2268708)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: dick greenhaus

FWIW, I've been calling them "teasers"

21 Feb 08 - 01:34 PM (#2268712)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Amos

"Boil Them Cabbage Down" has several meritorious examples, as well. I don't know the literary term, if there is one.


A

21 Feb 08 - 01:37 PM (#2268714)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Peace

"I don't know the literary term, if there is one."

A Work In Progress

21 Feb 08 - 01:39 PM (#2268718)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: open mike

dangling participle?

21 Feb 08 - 01:39 PM (#2268719)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: open mike

censored?

21 Feb 08 - 11:45 PM (#2269224)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Joe_F

Dick G.: I think, in fact, "tease rhyme" is the technical term.

This girl had a sister -- I blush to confess,
She once met a man and began to un-
Nerve his by zipping her dress down the front,
But only to give him a look at her
Cunning gold necklace that she always wore,
But he grew afraid that she might be a
Horrible schemer and up to some trick,
But she said "I see that you have a hard
Problem you might take in hand if you tried",
So he stepped up to her and put it in
These words: He said that when he lived in France,
The ladies he like let him into their
Plans, and would tell him what they'd like to do,
So she said "Stop talking, 'cause I want to
Scratch my mosquito bites right where they itch",
And he said "Well, I am a son of a
Bishop, but I'll be a layman instead",
So he picked her up gently and laid her in
Sweet violets, etc.

22 Feb 08 - 12:06 AM (#2269232)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Melissa

I would call this a Suggestive Merger:
"And though the prices were high
folks were ready to buy
her beautiful, beautiful eggs"

I would call this a Distraction Rhyme:
"a bee came along and stung him on the
cocktail, ginger ale.."

I would call this a Dangloid:
"we opened up our squirrel guns
and really gave them...well, we fired our guns.."

22 Feb 08 - 02:43 AM (#2269277)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

I bought my wife a party dress with buttons down the front
And every time I did one up she swore I touched her
Come you here, sit you down, we'll have duck for supper...

I can't remmeber the rest, but it is another of the 'Sweet Violets' group.
Anyhow, my question has been answered (I think).
Thanks to all

23 Feb 08 - 01:46 AM (#2270138)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: iancarterb

If 'dangloid' is original, Melissa, you should get a prize for it!

23 Feb 08 - 02:12 AM (#2270141)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Melissa

a tasteful little trophy would be fine...nothing overly gaudy, please.

23 Feb 08 - 04:26 AM (#2270183)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Darowyn

A replacement for a 'blue' word by another non-rhyming word, could be, by analogy with an interrupted cadence in music, an interrupted rhyme.
An actual rhyme, or a change of context in order to put the rhyming word into an innocent-sounding phrase, such as the 'cocktail' example above would be covered by the more general context of inuendo, since there is nothing special about the rhyme itself.
Cheers
Dave

23 Feb 08 - 06:03 AM (#2270202)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Bonnie Shaljean

I always got a kick out of Sweet Violets when I was a kid - you beat me to it, Robyn! If you don't know the melody you can sing it to just about any waltz tune -

SWEET VIOLETS

Cy Coben & Charles Grean

There once was a farmer who took a young miss
To the back of a barn where he gave her a
Lecture on horses and chickens and eggs
And told her that she had such beautiful
Manners which suited a girl of her charms
A girl that he wanted to take in his
Washing and ironing and then if she did
They could get married and raise lots of

        Sweet violets
        Sweeter than all the roses
        Covered all over from head to toe
        Covered all over with sweet violets

The girl told the farmer that he'd better stop
And she called her father and he called a
Taxi and got there before very long
Cause someone was doing his little girl
Right for a change and so that's why he said
If you marry her son you're better off
Single cause it's always been my belief
Marriage will bring a man nothing but

The farmer decided he'd wed anyway
And started in planning for his wedding
Suit which he purchased for only one buck
But then he found out he was clean out of
Money and so he got left in the lurch
Standing and waiting in front of the
End of this story which just goes to show
All a girl wants from a man is his

        Sweet violets...

23 Feb 08 - 07:49 PM (#2270656)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Joe_F

Of all the fishes in the seas,
The strangest is the bass.
It climbs into the tops of trees
And slides down on its hands and knees
To frolic in the grass.

23 Feb 08 - 08:53 PM (#2270691)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Rowan

And from the school yard where I grew up;

Tarzan swings!
Tarzan falls!
Tarzan hangs
by the hairs of his...
Now don't be mistaken
and don't be misled;
Tarzan hangs
by the hairs of his head!

Cheers, Rowan

24 Feb 08 - 03:24 PM (#2271202)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Bert

And there's Nobby Hall.

24 Feb 08 - 08:45 PM (#2271459)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: GUEST,Jim

The technical term for an unfinished rhyme is PROSE.

24 Feb 08 - 09:44 PM (#2271522)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Peace

"The technical term for an unfinished rhyme is PROSE. "

Excellent.

24 Feb 08 - 11:53 PM (#2271567)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Bert

Not really. It is more of an 'implied rhyme'.

25 Feb 08 - 02:45 AM (#2271608)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

Perhaps I had better find a site on Poetry rather than Music!

25 Feb 08 - 05:54 AM (#2271660)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Georgiansilver

Tech term for unfinished rhyme......must be 'rhym'

25 Feb 08 - 09:27 AM (#2271744)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

You have been beaten to that one by several days...See the 3rd post in the thread.

25 Feb 08 - 09:38 AM (#2271752)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Georgiansilver

Oops and I must have read it! It's the age thing.........

25 Feb 08 - 09:50 AM (#2271760)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Mr Happy

Another one from schooldays:


Rule Britannia! two monkeys up a stick
One fell down and broke his
Dicky was a bulldog a-lying in the grass
Along came a bumblebee and stung him on his
Ask no questions, told no lies
Have you ever seen a Chinaman doing up his
Flies are a nuisance, fleas are worse
And that is the end of a very naughty verse

25 Feb 08 - 10:44 AM (#2271828)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Stilly River Sage

There are enough books of bawdy lyrics around that someone must discuss this. The Erotic Muse, or something by Oscar Brand?

I just pulled out Cray's second edition of The Erotic Muse and on page xviii is this observation:

    Prior to the sixteenth century, the word "fuck" carried no opprobrium. Sometime after 1571, when it appeared in a poem satirizing the clergy, the word fell into disrepute, to appear only in learned dictionaries and underground literature.

    As early as 1300, "shit" appears in print as a verb; "piss" is equally as old. Until perhaps the middle of the eighteenth century, their use was perfectly acceptable. Up to the fifteenth century, "cunt" meant "cunt" and there was no attempt to find new euphemism or dysphemism for this anatomical feature.

    Though it was considered to be correct from 1000 A.D. on, the word "breast" fell into disrepute with the Victorians, and was replaced by the more ambiguous "bosom." A hundred years later, "breast" is again in use, and "bosom" relegated to flowery valentines and women's clothing patterns.

    According to Peter Fryer's Mrs. Grundy, Studies in English Prudery, the word "cock," even when it did not refer to the penis, was banned well before the Age of Queen Victoria. The male chicken was a rooster after 1772. Cockroaches became just roaches in the 1820s. Haycocks were renamed haystacks at the same time. [Sounds like Queen Victoria's reign isn't so much the source of the prudish ideas, but coincided with the prudish movement fully underway and became associated with it]

    [snip] (several paragraphs describing "obscene" and skipping to pg. xix)

    Not until postal inspector Anthony Comstock mounted his crusade in the 1870s did the United States Congress get around to passing laws against mailing sexually graphic matter. Paradoxically, the United States Constitution now protects those speeches and pronouncements that in defaming a particular religion were once felt to be criminally actionable.


From there, edited and redacted text of songs is discussed, and I think if you read between the lines you'll come up with a context to help establish a sort of public performance (music hall) context in which self-editing required the sly re-write of formerly openly bawdy songs.

This is of course a semi-educated guess. Cray lists a number of other collectors of these songs so you might have to visit your local music library to track down some more discussion of music censorship in the context of suppression by clergy, the mail, and the courts.

SRS

25 Feb 08 - 11:04 AM (#2271851)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Stilly River Sage

I should have finished that thought. A lot of the songs cited above are newer than the text described, but don't you think that the *wink wink* nature of substitution is easy enough to cause a critical mass of its own, and lead folks to build that style into new songs?

SRS

25 Feb 08 - 01:08 PM (#2271965)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

Yes, this is all very interesting, but doesn't actually answer the QUESTION. We now have many excellent examples of the style, but not the technical term for it!

25 Feb 08 - 04:31 PM (#2272170)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Stilly River Sage

The excerpt I cited discussed "euphemism" and "dysphemism" (highlighted). That second term would tend to mean substituting a coarser name for the word you mean (an online dictionary suggests that a man says he wants "axle grease" when he really wants "butter.") The words substituted in the verses you are asking about tend to be more sly than euphemistic. I don't know if you could go so far as to use dysphemism to describe them. But it's worth considering.

It may not be the right answer, but I pulled a book off of the shelf and read several pages before typing in a possible answer to your query. Do you perhaps want to rephrase that last complaint? It was, after all, an attempt to answer the QUESTION.

SRS

25 Feb 08 - 10:30 PM (#2272413)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Rowan

From the thread on "Back of Bus Songs", via Mr Red comes "rhyme refused", posted about 7 years ago.

Cheers, Rowan

25 Feb 08 - 10:38 PM (#2272416)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: wysiwyg

It's not an unfinished rhyme-- it's an un-rhyme. It begs the rhyme.

~S~

26 Feb 08 - 02:14 AM (#2272503)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: pavane

SRS,
Thank you for your work but "euphemism" and "dysphemism" have nothing to do with rhyming. They relate to word replacement, not the unfinished rhyme, which doesn't HAVE to be a euphemism or have any bawdiness at all, like this one quoted above.

Manners that suited a girl of her charms,
A girl that he wanted to take in his
Washing and ironing

The method is specific to verse, and I am sure I have seen a term for it, but I just can't remember it.

WYSIWYG
The point is that the listener is EXPECTING a rhyme, and usually a particular word, but a different word is substituted, which may actually rhyme in a different way

In the first example I gave, you are expecing a rhyming scheme of abab or abcb but you actually get abcc.

So instead of a rhmye for GLASS, you get one for STATIC

26 Feb 08 - 10:22 AM (#2272720)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Stilly River Sage

I understood that, and my point for being uppity is that now that more examples have been presented, as have some possible definitions of parts of the process, that you might search more productively. The name of the whole might come from the part.

Maybe you should check with Oscar Brand. He probably knows what it is you're asking about.

SRS

26 Feb 08 - 12:45 PM (#2272819)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: dick greenhaus

As mentioned above, both "Teaser" and "tease rhyme" have been more or less widely used. Is there something wrong with these terms?

26 Feb 08 - 06:05 PM (#2273097)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Snuffy

I guess people think it's got more credibility if you can find a pseudo-Greek word to give the same meaning. Buggered if I can find one though.

27 Feb 08 - 12:00 AM (#2273348)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Stilly River Sage

Ha! I had the same thought when I read Dick's answer, but I sure wasn't able to find one. If it has been discussed in scholarly circles, there is bound to be a literary term or name somewhere.

27 Feb 08 - 12:11 AM (#2273351)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Melissa

the 'proper' term should be easily found in texts for Writing/Poetry classes. Of course, that's not half as much fun as making things up.

29 Aug 08 - 05:39 AM (#2425234)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: GUEST,JD

There's a nice example of this style on youtube sung by Bob Saget

29 Aug 08 - 08:29 AM (#2425317)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: GUEST,Betsy at Work

What about ode interruptus. It has it's parallels with human behaviour in the unfinished sense.

29 Aug 08 - 09:39 AM (#2425362)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Lighter

Joe, what's the collecting data behind your Feb. 21 rhyme? Sung or only recited?

Now. back to the merriment.

29 Aug 08 - 09:50 AM (#2425374)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Mr Red

Thankyou Rowan. I wouldn't have found myself that far back.

Rhyme refused is how I describe them. Usually adding the word "telegraphed" to show that it is expected.

By making it obvious and refusing the rhyme you get humour from it. Particularly if you can use aliteration with the "refused" word, and drag-out the humour.

I use the device sometimes in my songs.

Another trick is to refuse the rhyme in it's expected place and then place it internally to another line and end the line with the same rhyme. If it makes the words stand out it has done its job, humour or serious.

29 Aug 08 - 08:24 PM (#2425951)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Joe_F

Lighter: It is a sequel to the one that begins "In the springtime,... of yore" & breaks into "Sweet Violets" at the end; it has the same tune. It was begun by Kat Kinkade of blessed memory and helped on by me (January 1986).

30 Aug 08 - 08:32 AM (#2426200)
Subject: RE: Tech term for unfinished rhyme
From: Sandy Mc Lean

Well I remember one that went something like this:

Two Irishmen, two Irishmen were digging in a ditch
One called the other one a dirty son of a...
Pitched him out the window
He landed on a rock a rock
Along came a bumblebee and stung him on his...
Cocktail, ginger ale, five cents a glass...
If you don't like it shove it up your...
Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies
If you ever get hit with a bucket of shit,
Be sure to close your eyes.