Young Writers Society

Hey guys. This really isn't homework, but it does deal with school, so I guess it goes here.

The speech season is about to start. I have my poetry piece picked out for this year ("How To Watch Your Brother Die", by Michael Lassell), but, unfortunately, that is not my main area of competition.

This will be my fourth year in Humorous Interp, and I'm having a bit of trouble finding a piece to work with. At one point, I thought I had it narrowed down to "The Ransom of Red Chief" by O. Henry, but then I started reading some David Sedaris, and narrowed it "down" to four possible pieces. Now I'm not too hyped up about Sedaris or Henry anymore, and am looking for other possible pieces.

The only criteria I need to meet are:

• The piece (including written, original intro) must be between 6-8 minutes. I can cut stuff out if the piece is too long.
• It must be a published work, because an ISBN is required if I want to compete in an NFL qualifying tournament.
• It must be relatively free from profanity (meaning that, if there is profanity in the piece, it has to be easy to change or omit).

The season starts in late January, but I'd like to have my humor piece, as well as my poetry piece, memorized before our first tournament, a two-day "baptism-by-fire".

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Wait... is this going to be a poetry piece or...?

Oh! I read the Red Ransom of the Chief or whatever, and it wasn't THAT funny. I mean, it was kind of comical, but these days the idea of people in pain is too overrated. Seriously.

Anyhow, try "The Landlady" by Roald Dahl. It's ironic, not TOO funny, but I thought it was funnier than the Ransom one.

Maybe you could do an exceprt from some really funny book...like Bridget Jones's Diary, etc. etc. ?

Snoink wrote:Wait... is this going to be a poetry piece or...?

Poetry obviously has to be a poem, and it has to have serious subject matter (the common theme is rape or dead babies, so a poetry piece on dealing with a brother dying of AIDS is a fresh change of pace).

Humorous Interp can either be poem or prose. I, as well as other competitors, commonly go with prose pieces, because they seem to tell a story better than just a funny poem. So, yeah, to clarify, I'm looking for a Humorous Interp piece in prose format.