Bullwinkle's Corner

Bullwinkle: Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat.
Rocky: Again?!
Bullwinkle: Nothing up my sleeve.
ROAR! (roaring animal pops out of hat)
Rocky: Now, here's something you'll really like!

Every early morning, me and my sister would wake up for the early morning cartoons. Obviously I was still young enough to enjoy waking up that early in the morning. One the cartoons we never missed was "Rocky and Bullwinkle."

"Rocky and Bullwinkle" introduced us to Fractured Fairytales, Peabody's Improbable History, and the Canadian Mounties with Dudley Do-Right. Little did we know how they were worping our views of the way the world really told fairy tales.

Browsing through the Costco DVD section, we came across Season One of Rocky and Bullwinkle. ooooooohhh! It was only til later on how I realized how genius the cartoons are in terms of being entertaining for kids yet throwing in jokes that "adults" could pick up as well. Even now, their silly spontaneity and goofiness sparks laughter. Bullwinkle was the innocent genius before Forrest Gump.

"Rocky and Bullwinkle" was set up like a 30 minute variety show with different segments. They understood the attention span of 5 year olds. Each story line was broken up with a cliffhanger ending.

Anyway, one of the segments was called Bullwinkle's Corner in which Bullwinkle recited a poem and enacted its words which of course ended up a big silly mess. For instance, he would recite, "little miss muffet" and Bullwinkle would be the Miss Muffet while Rocky questioned what a tuffet is and would fill in as the spider roll.

In some ways, it was my first exposure to a poetry reading and what poetry is. I would later recognize some of the poetry as coming from the classic English poets, but in cartoon form it wasn't so distant or detached from my life.