COMPETITION
No. 561: Moon struck
'He shoots higher that threatens the moon than he that aims at a tree' (George Her- bert). Next week's attempt to send men to the moon deserves poetic commemoration: competitors are invited to provide this, in the style of any poet of their fancy from William Shakespeare to William McGona- gall. Maximum fourteen lines; entries, marked 'Competition No. 561', by 25 July.
No. 558: The winners
Charles Seaton reports: The Living Theatre of America on its appearance at the Round- house obtained some surprisingly submissive reviews. Readers were asked to submit ex- tracts from reviews written by critics of earlier days—Shaw, Hazlitt or Pepys. Pepys was the most popular as critic: here, for example, are Adam Khan's entry (three guineas): So home again considering of what I had seen and thanking God my wife hadd not been with me. For why a grown man should pay to see that which his own glass might shew him with greater proffit and pleasure to himself, is more than I do know. And a man who would so encourage his wife to behold the privy parts of actors must be assured indeed of the greater attractiouns of his own. or be not surprised if she, finding lewde pleasure in gazing upon strange fruits, come to prefer them to those in his own garden.
and Fergus Porter's (also three guineas): At night to the playhouse. That there was money charged for that the like of which can be seen in Bedlam for the mere going there astoundeth me. One fellow, more lean and hairy and bolder than the rest, did entreat me in the name of liberty to doff my breeches. Which entreaty I did refuse for the playhouse is no privy chamber. Yet was there a wench that, had she been in some degrees more wholesome, might have made me less ready with my refusal. Did note her name. And so to bed.
G. J. Blundell wins two guineas for his Hazlitt: For my part, while I think a rousing argu- ment or bout of fisticuffs with a bargee or costermonger furnishes as good a dramatic entertainment as any other the world can offer, I object to being charged hard cash for it. That is my complaint against the Living Theatre. I do not particularly mind a fellow's kicking me in the teeth—provided always that I may kick back—but I must express the most determined opposition to his putting his hand in my breeches pocket on the impudent assumption that he is en- titled to be reimbursed for having injured me.
As T. Griffith's Shaw points out: 'the truth is that we have a dearth of good drama, not of pubic hair.' Shaw drew slightly fewer entries than Pepys, including Martin Fagg (three guineas): I have, in my time, been accused of all the more sensational vices, but nobody has ever hit so far below the belt as to accuse me of modesty about my own endowments. Never- theless, even someone as justifiably con- ceited as myself must regretfully conclude, after a scrutiny of his genitalia, that he can- not muster the impertinence to demand con- siderable sums of money for the privilege of perusing them. Living Theatre's cast do just this: at last, in them. I meet people who have an effrontery greater even than my own—and, having that, they must obviously have genius as well....
and P. W. R. Foot (four guineas): Why all this pother about taking off one's clothes? It only emphasises the inequality Of man and is misleading about income. Dys- peptic Henry Ford cut a poor figure as a rich nude whereas any fat-bellied tramp may be deemed the new aristocracy. Let nudity flourish if it dispenses with the myths of power and money or the image of God. Let copulation take place on the stage as long as I am not compelled to watch it. It would bore me. When I make love it is different— but the intellectual ecstasy of the drama is more satisfying.
Commended are: Maurice Hall, Vera Telfer, Peter Peterson and Molly Fitton.
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