For those new to Madness! Poetry and for those who have been part of it since the beginning, this is our origin story, presented as a timeline of vignettes that capture the magic as it happened.
01.08.2012 — VISITOR ADVISORY WARNING ⚠️
Ed DeCaria launches his Think, Kid, Think! website publicly with a post titled “VISITOR ADVISORY WARNING”, cautioning visitors that the site may not play by the same rules as other kidlit blogs. This will prove prophetic in myriad ways, for better and for worse.
01.13.2012 — Poetry Friday 🗓
Ed participates in “Poetry Friday” for the first time, contributing an original poem "Who Is This Woman and Why Is She Trying to Kiss Me?" He enjoys the high of seeing people read and respond to his work for the first time. For three more weeks, he continues to participate in the weekly roundup, visit other poetry sites, and meet new poets. Their enthusiasm for the genre gets him thinking ...
02.09.2012 — A Crazy Idea 😜
Ed posts a half-baked idea for a kids' poetry tournament in his post "Madness! Writing 126 New Children’s Poems in 21 Days", making clear that 1) the idea probably won't work, 2) he doesn't even know 64 poets, and 3) almost everyone who volunteers to participate is going to lose.
02.11.2012 — Maybe It’s Not So Crazy 🤔
Sixteen writers, mostly from the Poetry Friday community, sign up to participate within 36 hours. People are talking. Invitations are flying. Could this really happen? Does Ed really want it to?
02.16.2012 — “Everybody’s Talking About It” 💬
Messages are coming in faster than Ed can respond to them. Caldecott Medal Winner Jane Yolen signs up. Everyone freaks out. Reigning Poet Laureate J. Patrick Lewis drops in to say hello minutes later. Superstar poet Kenn Nesbitt throws his hat in the ring, and invites a number of other famed poets to do the same. Ed's brain explodes.
03.05.2012 — This Is Really Happening 🌋
64 people have signed up to write poems at the command of an unpublished, possibly-insane blogger who has tricked them all into thinking he knows what he's doing, which he most certainly does not.
03.06.2012 — Launch Week ☕️
What would in future years prove to be 2-3 weeks of manual prep work is crammed into 5 nights, during which Ed sleeps a cumulative 10 hours. He does not die, so by folk logic he is now stronger. Launch week ends with a "Selection Sunday" video revealing the first ever tournament bracket.
03.11.2012 — "You Just Made USA TODAY" 📰
The Madness! Poetry tournament is mentioned in USA Today. It doesn't even start until tomorrow. Everybody IS talking about it.
03.12.2012 — 1-bruise vs. 16-androgynous 🧱
The first Madness! word pairing is posted, and for the first time participants truly realize what they're in for. Poems are due 36 hours. Busy day? No excuses. Tired? Tough luck. Need to include the word "androgynous" in a kids’ poem? Take it up with that brick wall over there.
03.13.2012 — Poetry Found 📣
The Poetry Foundation, headquartered in Ed's backyard in Chicago, promotes the event on its website and tweets a link to 100,000 people. They all show up at the exact same time. Luckily we had enough to read.
03.26.2012 — Win? Lose? Who Cares. It's A Party! 🎉
Two weeks blow by. Poems litter the site. Writers, now referred to as “authletes”, are dropping like dactyls. Votes are cast. Leads are mounted, then surmounted. Complaints are filed. Fates are accepted. The show must go on.
03.29.2012 — Poetry Breaks The Internet ❗️
The Think, Kid, Think! website crashes repeatedly as visitors furiously refresh their browsers to see the latest results. Hearts break. Heads hang. Letters of abuse from web hosts are sent. Poetry wins.
04.02.2012 — Crowning A Champion 🌍
"Unpublished potential superstar" Stephen W. Cahill wins his sixth consecutive matchup to become the first ever Madness! Poetry Champion. His word prompts, from first to final round, were: innuendo, marginalize, varnish, warbled, barnacle, and bovine.
04.09.2012 — Final Tally 1️⃣2️⃣6️⃣
When the dust cleared, we looked back at what happened. 64 poets wrote 126 poems in just three weeks, during which they were cheered on by 12,000 people, who visited the site over 100,000 times.
04.30.2012 — A New Community 🤝
The tournament is over, but no one wants to leave. Having exchanged over 1,800 comments during the event, relationships that budded during Madness! continue to bloom elsewhere on kidlit blogs, on social media, and in real life.
… and lastier, but not leastiest:
12.07.2012 — The Thinkier Trophy 🏆
Ed unveils The Thinkier, a traveling trophy named after Allan Wolf’s clever rhyme with his Round One prompt word “kinkier” (yes, really), to be engraved with the name of each year's champion and sent to live with them for a year. Or a few months. Or never. It depends who wins and how much else there is going on in the world, really.
⏩ And 10+ years and 1,000+ poems later … the rest is history.