video; un: eproghuefgdzptrrw

[vorrutyer]

[ Byerly Vorrutyer is sitting in front of a piano, fingers on the keys. Byerly Vorrutyer is also, apparently, drunk. There's a bottle of brandy in front of him balanced beside the music rack that's two-thirds drained, and there's a tiny sway in his posture, and he looks sloppy - suit coat opened, shirt-collar loosened. When he speaks, his voice slurs. But as he talks, he plays Chopin beautifully, expressively. He only misses the very occasional note. ]

God help me, but this place is dull. And I know from dull. I spent an entire season - an entire season! - on the Vorinnis estate on the South Continent. If Lady Vorinnis hadn't been there to distract me with all her deliciousness, I'd have actually, literally, died of boredom. I nearly set fire to the whole taiga. Roasted all the little birdies and rabbits and peasants. Pheasants. Peasants. Whichever.

[ He sighs mournfully, casting a sorrowful glance at the camera. ]

Say, fellows, how does a man have fun around here? It's clear no one knows how to play whist, so that's out, and dueling for laughs seems tacky. I've already watched a few of you brutes bash one another's faces in, which had its charms and no doubt, but the time for that is over. I can't play bed, wed, behead with you, because you're all proles of no account and no education who wouldn't know the high-society names I mention to you. Oh!

[ He sits up a bit, stopping his playing mid-note, right before the end of the first section of the piece. What a musical anticlimax. ]

I've got one. I'll write limericks about you. Tell me a bit about yourself, and I'll write limericks. Go on, do. They'll be funny, I promise - this is one of my favorite games. Absolutely kills at parties.

[ And then, with a small bow - ]

Byerly Vorrutyer, Emperor of Barrayar, at your lyrical service.

Comments

[knitpick]

Are you suggesting there's no room for indecency in the more elegant poetic structures?
Someone needs to review the Bard's works again.

[vorrutyer]

No, no, that's not what I'm suggesting in the least. I'm simply leaping to the defense of the limerick. What does the sonnet have on it? Length? That's about all.

[knitpick]

It has the requirement of iambic pentameter, which I've always found very pleasing to the ear.
And it doesn't call to mind an Irishman already deep in his cups at four in the afternoon.
So that's two points in favor of the sonnet.

[vorrutyer]

[ An arched brow. ]

Ah, so we're being elitist now. Dismissing poetic forms because they remind you of undesirables.

[knitpick]

My mother was an awful alcoholic.
I think I'm justified in my distaste.

[vorrutyer]

As was mine, but I'm not taking it out on poor innocent blameless poetry.

[knitpick]

Wasn't it you pointing out that the limerick is very frequently not at all innocent?

[vorrutyer]

All right, poor smutty blameless poetry.

[knitpick]

You're so determined to defend the honor of the limerick, yet you've made no attempt to demonstrate its strengths.
Where is the custom poem I was promised?

[vorrutyer]

Well, I still know next to nothing about you, except your self-mythologizing.

[knitpick]

You sound skeptical.
I haven't even mentioned the truly mythic parts of this story.
They didn't quite fit the meter.

[vorrutyer]

Oh, I think skepticism is hardly appropriate after all we've been through. I'm simply pointing out that you don't know anything about someone from a poem like the one you gave me.

[knitpick]

There's plenty to know if one just pays attention.
But I'll give you a freebie:
In the world I came from, I had the title of Seer of Light.

[vorrutyer]

Dear lady, do you not understand how party games work? This isn't an ooh-I'm-so-special-investigate-me sort of situation. If I have a sexual interest in you, that's the time to play mysterious. When a fellow is writing your biography in verse, that's not the time.

[knitpick]

I should hope you don't have any sexual interest in me.
While it might be rather romantic to fall for a person for their words alone, having never seen their face, I don't think this particular case would work out.
You're far too old for me.
Also, I have a girlfriend.
There's another detail for your biographical poetry.