SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. so

Report by Yvette Sheringham Incertitude, 4 uses delkes Vous et moi nous nous en allons Comme s'en tout les ecrevisses,

A reculons, a recIIICIIS.

GUILLAUME APOLLINAIRE.

A prize of £5 was offered for four lines of English or French' verse, urging the poet and his uncertainty to make a change in their plans.

Apollinaire shares with most French intellectualOand all French children the innocent belief that crayfish go backwards. (Don't they ever ?) Two-thirds of the entries let him get away with it, probably because he was getting nowhere in any case ; but in one- third British accuracy was very shocked indeed at French practical haziness, and often ignored the subject of the competition in order to get the facts, at least, straight. The poet was sent to the corner, with his poem over his head, to revise his views on natural history. One dismissed him with quiet contempt, another with loud ' dis- approval, and all the time teachers were fidgeting with the pages of their dictionaries, to find out whether ecrevisse was crab, crayfish, or neither, or both. Here is an instance of quiet contempt, sent by Simia: Uncertainty, Guillaume ? Plain ignorance, Keep sharper eyes next time, on shore and tideways, Before you fudge your images on chance, Crabs don't recoil, but scramble sideways.

Significantly, perhaps, several French versions—often with less piquancy but stronger culinary tradition—whispered to the poet to cat his crayfish: Quand roils, Monsieur, et vos deices, Arriverez a reculons,

Devorez ta vos ecrevisses,

Li restez dans les environs. (Elizabeth Frisby) It was also in the French entries—equal in number to the English ones—that moral indignation (as opposed to scientific) reached the peak of dramatic rebuke, with Miss D. E. Jack's: A reculons? Denature!

as well as the highest overflow of soul: Excelsior. voila devise Qui inspira le genre humain. (Miss E. Munson) It was surprising to see what a wretched man could get for drifting backwards, alone or accompanied, and what a variety of arguments could be banged in to influence his next step: principles, flying fish, loyalties, kangaroos, the secret of life, the war, the bees, the Almighty, the Iron Curtain, life eternal, to say nothing of geometry and astronomy as well as other delectable irrelevancies. On tiptoe came this unexpected advice:

Ii vaudrait mieux. Incertitude

Eviler wide decision. (Helen B. M. Aitchison) While another suggested a rotative movement, hardly a change for the better, but no doubt a change SECOND PRIZES

(IRVINE GRAY)

Pauvres poisons, ecoutez Marchez dune focon plus droite, Sinon rous risquerez. nsa fol. D'iti des ecrevisses en bike.

(R. S. STANIER)

'Mid all your doubts, Apollinaire, Know 'tis not safe (or even safish) To take french leave (or even the air) Tiptoeing backwards like a crayfish.

(Joyce lomvsoN) Crayfish in water backward go, In fire do salamanders ply, A mole in earth downward—so A poll in air should upward fly. " A reculons. a reculons" arouses, I am sorry to say, a great deal of bullying from the sturdy: the poet is now in the corner not only for shameful ignorance but for weakness of character: "You're no crayfish, be a man." (Rose Fyleman); "For God sake, man, make up your mind." (Hugh N. Noclachlan); and from Mrs. P.

Stock: Thou trying mood of indecision So foreign to my active mind.

Utter boredom came from progressive circles: O.K., Apollinaire, now stow it, We're sick of all your mental fog.

Teasing joined in: Souvenez-vous que vous rates Pas icrevisse, mais ecrivain. T. J. Smiley) From Vienna, by telegram, came a pally slap on the back: Mais non, mon cher, jen prends ombrage De reader, quel iriste courage. (0. L. Ladner) Instead of an entry, H. V. Burton contributed a text extracted from Lewis Carroll: Will you walk a link, faster Said the whiting to the snail, There's a porpoise just behind me, And he's treading on my tail.

In the same spirit as Lewis Carroll, Capt. E. H. Whitford-Hawkey offered a perfect solution.

But if a bull across the mead Behind us, dear Incertitude, Came charging, then indeed Perhaps we'd change our attitude.

With entries piling high—filled by the whole possible range of address—" mon cher," "mon vieux," " Monsieur," "poor bard," " poor fool," and, even better, "0 sad and backward man of gloom "—Apollinaire certainly came as near to his English audience as he could safely come. But for the honour of crayfish—if they don't go backwards—it is to be regretted that this controversy is posthumous.

I would award the first prize of £2 to G. Rostrevor Hamilton, whose four lines combined advice and zoological exactitude with the swing of Apollinaire's rhythm, and a second prize to be shared equally between Irvine Gray, who sent the best warning, R. S. Stanier for his playful approach, and Joyce Johnson, whose pun I enjoyed.

FIRST PRIZE

(G. ROSTREVOR HAM uuroN)

Backwards Why so certain whither ? You and your delices on tideways Devious should—as-crabs do—slither Sideways, Guillaume, sideways.