Limerick World Records

Ael, a young poet from Chennai, India, handwrote a five-line limerick on a clipboard in 34.25 seconds. The poem follows the classic AABBA rhyme: a ghost who sat on a post, gave a great scream, dissolved in a dream, and vanished, almost. The continuous overhead video shows every line going down in pen under an on-screen timer, which stops as the last word is finished. A whole ghost story, rhymed and done in about half a minute.

Milan author and longtime teacher Sergio Roedner kept revising Il libro dei 1000 limerick until the book matched its title, and his 11 November 2026 edition replaces the remaining repeats with 20 new poems, most of them English riffs on Edward Lear printed after the Lear originals they answer. His Italian limericks run from a braying mayor in Zoagli to a woman in Parma who blames every odd mishap on a past life. RecordSetter compared the full text of all 1,000 numbered entries and counted 1,000 different limericks of his own, leaving out the Lear and Gianni Rodari poems he quotes for comparison.

Sam Klarich, Abby, Brittani, and Emily each read the first four limericks of John Ciardi’s The Hopeful Trout And Other Limericks[] in a combined two minutes, 18.92 seconds. The four limericks they read were The Elephant Boy, Goodbye Please, The Thingamajig and Keeping Busy Is Better Than Nothing.