Cockroach and Twine

In 1916, newspaper columnist Don Marquis created the character Archy, a poet who was reincarnated as a cockroach for the crime of writing free-verse poetry. Archy and his sometime friend Mehitabel, a cat who claimed to be the reincarnation of Cleopatra, continued to make appearances in Marquis’ column through the early 20th century’s major events and minor fads. The turtle poem (“Archy and the Old 'Un”) was initially published in 1923. Other included poems date from earlier, according to the timeline in The Annotated Archy and Mehitabel. Warning: suicide mention.