Learning to read with nonsensical gibberish ("Jabberwocky")

Looking back at the first four poems I reviewed I noticed a common pattern. Can you guess what it might be? I know that Kubla Khan's pleasure dome seems pretty far removed from the frozen north, and that the refined Lady of Shallot would seem very out of place beside Pancho and Lefty the bandits. But there is one thing that all four poems have in common.

They all make sense.

Now, this sort of imbalance is ridiculous. Four poems that make sense and not a one that doesn't? In fact, I would say that at least 80% of the world doesn't make sense, like politics or movie logic. So to remedy this, I've decided to review "Jabberwocky", by Lewis Caroll, as my fifth poem.

A Jabberwock that apparently never learned to keep your eye on the guy with the vorpal sword.

"Jabberwocky" sets itself apart from the pack by being utter nonsense. Most of the words are made up, like "brillig" and "frumious". And yet, it still manages to tell a story. And now I'm going to tell that story to you.

It's about a "beamish" young lad, who lives in a forest of borogroves (which I assume to be a type of tree) with nothing but his father and some slithy toves for company. His father, worrying about his son and knowing well the indiscretion and general beamishness of the young, gives him a strong warning.
"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

Now, the Jabberwock sounds pretty scary, but a Jubjub bird doesn't sound so bad to me. It sounds tasty, like jellybeans. The Bandersatch sounds more like one to fear than the Jubjub bird, but he just gets shunned. But frumious Bandersnatches or no frumious Bandersnatches, the boy decides to ignore the warning and go Jabberwock-huntin with his vorpal sword. Now, today we all know what vorpal means - a weapon enchantment priced at the equivalent of six static damage upgrades allowing the removal of a limb on a critical hit if a fortitude saving throw is failed - but vorpal wasn't a word back then. I know, it's hard to imagine that there was a day when people didn't know the intricate details of every obscure D&D magic item, but there was. Weird, huh? In other words, this 'nonsense' poem coined a word that is now used in common speech. Three, actually - it also coined "galumphing" and "chortled" - but those aren't nearly as well-known as vorpal. And so, with his overpowered sword, he went searching for his manxome foe the jabberwock. Unfortunately, he had a lot of forest to cover, and failed his search check completely. After his fruitless search he rested by the Tumtum tree to think his uffish thoughts. Right then, though, the burbling Jabberwock whiffled out of the tulgey woods with its eyes of flame to slay the lad! But with the huge thing's abysmal stealth checks, our hero successfully won initiative and severed its head with a grim snicker-snack. Then he galumphed back to his father with the big ugly head under his arm.

At the return of his triumphant son, the father absolutely chortled with happiness. "Callooh! Callay!" he shouted in celebration. The whole poem is nonsensical, but this line still stands out from the rest with its ridiculousness. I think the dad had probably been drinking something while his son was Jabberwock hunting.

And that's the end of the poem, with everything peaceful again. In fact, the first stanza is repeated again just to stress that things are as before. The Bandersnatch and Jubjub bird are absent from the action and do not make an appearance, and we never learn the nature of the 'slithy toves'. But despite these absences, "Jabberwocky" is regarded as one of the best nonsense poems in the english language. I would recommend reading the full poem to get the full effect, but I still hope you got something out of my review. Anyways, enjoy the nonsense!

-Paddywagon Man