Violet Olddear seething yesterday
A Petersfield pensioner has launched a stinging attack on professional poet Spam Spares, claiming the famous wordsmith stole her work.
Violet Olddear, 97, couldn’t believe her ears when she went along to a show by Spares at Sheet Village Hall.
“I couldn’t believe my ears…possibly because I’m a bit deaf,” confirmed Violet. “But I know what I heard – and I heard Spam reading out one of my poems and claiming it was hers.”
The former engine stoker says she sent the poem in question, The Cat, to Spam to see what she thought of it, and was dismayed to hear it read out loud at the show.
The dispute must now be settled in court before the controversial work can be included in a new collection of poems by Spares, who shot to semi-fame for about a fortnight in the ‘70s.
She appeared on TV’s Old Faces – a kind of forerunner to The X Factor – reading a poem about her teeth, and has been attempting to live off that fleeting moment of semi-celebrityness ever since.
Poetry expert Fred Stanza says the poem is almost certainly by Spares, commenting “The symmetry is perfect – this is obviously the work of a professional.”
Judge for yourself here’s the disputed poem in full:
My cat sat on the mat
And then he ate my hat
What do you think of that?
Drat, drat, drat, drat…drat
Mrs Olddear added “This is not the first time someone has stolen my work. I wrote a poem back in the ‘80s called Panic On The Streets Of Steep and it was used without my permission by that young Morrissey Smith fellow.
“And I wrote another one called I’m A Twisted Firestarter, which I later heard on the radio set to some awful modern beat. And don’t get me started on that John Lemming chap I met once in Liverpool…”
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