"Spectator" Competitions

RULES AND CONDITIONS Entries must be typed or very clearly written on one side of the paper only. The name and address, or pseudonym, of the competitor must be on each entry and not on a separate sheet. When a word limit is set words must be counted and the number given. No entries can be returned. Prizes may be divided at the discretion of the judge, or withheld if no entry reaches the required standard. The judge reserves the right to print or quote from any entry. The judge's decision is final, and no correspondence can be entered into on the subject of the award. Entries must be addressed to :—The Editor, the Spectator, 99 Cower Street,

London, W.C. 1, and be marked on the envelope Competition No. (—).

Competition No. 18 (Set by " SCADAVAY.") A PRIZE of £.3 3s. is offered for the best suggestion as to how either (a) an Irish dramatist, or (b) a Scandinavian dramatist, or (c) a very young dramatist with Expres- sionist tendencies, or (d) Mr. Noel Coward, would—if they got the chance—write the dialogue for those well-known advertisements of either Mr. Duggie Stuart (the Book- maker) or Mr. Drage (the Furniture Dealer) in which Lord Edward and Mr. and Mrs. Everyman play the most prominent parts. There is a limit of 400 words, inclusive of stage-directions.

Entries must be received not later than Monday, August 17th, 1931. The result of this competition will appear in our issue of August 29th.

The result of Competition No. 17 will appear in our next issue.

Competition No. 19 (Set by "Doom.") A PRIZE of £3 3s. is offered for a Dinner Menu, written in not less than twelve, and not more than twenty, lines of English rhymed verse.

Entries must be received not later than Monday, August 24th, 1931. The result of this competition will appear in our issue of September 5th.

Report of Competition No. 16

(REPORT AND AWARD BY " SCADAVAY.") POSTERITY remembers an eminent landscape gardener of the eighteenth century as " Capability" Brown. A prize of three guineas was offered for the best suggestions for nicknames similarly coined from an abstract quality for any three of the following : Mr. Winston Churchill, Mr. A. P. Herbert, Mr. C. B. Cochran, Mr. Walter Lindrum, Miss Marlene Dietrich, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, Mr. Noel Coward, Miss Gertrude Stein, Mr. Phil Scott, Mr. Hannen Swaffer.

I asked, you will observe, for nicknames coined from an abstract quality. So it is no good trying to fob me off, 0 gentleman from East Kilbride, with 250 words of allegorical horoscope written in the style of Old Moore. Nor when I receive (from Highgate) a list of three nicknames written in a fair round hand, but consisting of : (a) the name of a reptile, (b) part of a verb of motion, and (c) a schoolboy term of abuse, am I likely to be favourably impressed by the statement that "the above words were chosen from Chambers' Dictionary." I am not incredulous ; I am indifferent. You have not done my competition. There were a lot of entries like that.

This was an easy competition to do, but a difficult one to do well. Most of the names on my list—and indeed, most of the figures who have achieved distinction or notoriety on the modern scene—have more than one string to their bow, so that their personalities are not easily to be indicated by a single abstraction. In some cases the dominant characteristic was too obvious to look like a winner. Dozens of people suggested " Changeability " (or "Mutability ") Churchill and " Versatility " (or "Audacity ") Coward. One or two, with a rather mean-spirited reluctance to commit themselves to the principles of Hit or Miss," sent in several entries which cut the ground from under each others' feet by simply interchanging the nicknames ; and I had the once unthinkable experience of seeing the same derogatory label applied alter- nately to Mr. Churchill and Mr. Swaffer.

Quite a lot of the competitors scored one hit with their three shots. Among them Mrs. M. Hargreaves, with " Aphasia " Stein • Mr. H. Miller, with . Prostration" Scott ; Miss Dorothy Crosskey, with " Continuity " Lindrum ; Mrs. Margaret Richardson, with " Antipathy " Swaffer ; Miss G. Workman, with " Reiterativity " Stein ; Capt. G. F. Ellenberger, with "Conference" MacDonald (not strictly within the rules, perhaps ; but conferences are coming daily nearer to ranking as abstractions) ; " Taihoa," with" Omnisci- ence" Swaffer ; "Bests," with " Top(s)icality " Herbert; Mr. S. Barrington McClean (out of a long, but largely irrelevant list) with" Camouflage" Cochran ; S. J., with " Superfluity" Swaffer ; and W. G., with" Vituperation" Churchill. " Cuni- culus " had two quite good suggestions—" Pulchritude" Cochran and " Siesta " Scott : the latter is a neat fit, but not cut to my pattern. Mr. V. Rigby was even more ingenious about this unhappy pugilist, who seems to have inspired most of the wit evoked by this competition ; he followed up " Astronomy " Scott with a fairly sound " Infallibility" Swaffer, but relapsed into the banal over Mr. Churchill. Mr. James Hall's allusions were too abstruse for me, but I feel his list—on which " Resignation " Scott was the most orthodox nickname—deserves to be honourably mentioned. Mr. L. V. Upward, with " Liberty " Herbert as his best, was a little too obvious and never drew away from the field. "Preciosity" Stein (from Mr. Guy lanes) lacked the stark, uncompromising flavour which the right soubriquet for that immortal poetess should have. " Rock " nearly qualified for a second prize with " Capacity " Cochran and "Paucity" MacDonald. Exactly why the latter nickname seems to me good would be hard to explain ; but there is something very happily sugges- tive about it.

The prize goes to Mr. G. W. Clarkson, of 16 Randolph Crescent, W. 9. He starts off with a very obvious attempt, but his other two—and particularly the last—make up for it.

THE PRIZE-WINNING ENTRY.

" Precocity " Coward.

" Dyspepsia " Stein.

" Insensibility " Scott.

G. W. CLARKSON.