What kind of poem is the spider and the fly

Founded by Andrew Motion and Julie Blake in , developed by The Poetry Archive with The Full English , and funded by the Department for Education , Poetry by Heart is a national poetry recitation competition open to all pupils and students in England aged between 14 and It is maintained and developed by The Full English as a resource for a national poetry recitation competition and for teaching and learning about poetry. For this activity you will need to work with two friends. One of you will play the part of the fly, one the spider and one will be the narrator. Go through the poem and highlight the lines that you will be saying. Read the poem out loud together. Now find a space and read your parts again this time adding actions.

The Spider and the Fly is a poem by Mary Howitt — , published in The first line of the poem is "'Will you walk into my parlour? The poem is a cautionary tale against those who use flattery and charm to disguise their true intentions. The opening line is one of the most recognized and quoted first lines in all of English verse. The line has been used and parodied numerous times in various works of fiction. When Lewis Carroll was readying Alice's Adventures Under Ground for publication he replaced a new version he had made of a negro minstrel song [3] with a parody of Howitt's poem The Mock Turtle's Song in his book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ; it mimics the meter and rhyme scheme and parodies the first line, but not the subject matter, of the original. The way into my parlour is up a winding stair, And I have many pretty things to shew when you get there.