COMPETITION
No. 584: Initial difficulties Set by Martin Fagg: Organisations %,ith identical initials proliferate in a most be- musing way. AA—once the preserve of the Architectural Association and the Auto. mobile Association, not to mention Alm holies Anonymous, has now been joined by the Anglican Association. Competitors are invited to imagine that they have sud- denly been called upon to propose a toast to 'the AA', while ignorant of which particular AA it is, and to provide a 120-word extract from the speech they would deliver. En- tries, marked 'Competition No. 584', by 2 January 1970.
No. 581:, The winners
Trevor Grove reports: There has been a good deal of discussion as to the pros and cons of teachers' strikes, but so far no comment from those most intimately con- cerned—the schoolchildren. Happily, com- petitors have now made good this deficienc by providing us with a selection of authent —in some rare cases positively bloodcurdl- ing—letters home from Billy Bunter, Tom Brown, molesworth i, Nicholas Nickleb and other well-known chums from the field of schoolboy fiction. John Digby gave us Holden Caulfield's reflections on being in- stalled at a strike-bound English publi school—a rare wheeze—but on the who!- it was the rather more well-established in mates who proved the most reliable re porters. Claire Barry's Molesworth, fo instance, wins two guineas: Deerest pater: Perchance you do not recog nise this fair hand which tells you a conserning the fate of molesworth i. Nev feer, all is well. I have taken yore advice t harte—uninhibited, i entered fully into th merrie life at St. custard's (chiz chiz). Feeb weeds or nobel colleague—we are all alit in this cosie circull—guzzling ginger and do-nuts at all hours. As i eeze myse into the Beak's lether throne, I see a sintila ting site befor me—a loyal band of sag chaned to our desks for the sake of the little frends. They care, pater; it chokes to think that they want to go on serving in their humbel way and all they ask for a few more pounds. Wot a small prise pay, wen the future of molesworth i and custard's is at stake!
Three guineas to each of the following Captain Rochester at Rugby: . . but the four or five masters who s out for the extra half-sovereign and they would not teach, the Doctor has lock
up in the attic of School-house where they are becoming ever thinner. Some of the fourth were for sneaking out and throw- ing crusts at their window but the Doctor explained to us all after prayers tonight how the labourer must be iniquitous indeed who is not worthy of his hire. 'Digna canis pabulo' was the tag. Arthur wept, but East and I went out to throw stones and shout blackguard names. Flashman is running a lottery on how long they shall survive and East and I have five days which is reckoned the favourite.
Ian Kelso and Psmith:
'Dearest Mater and Pater: I am so utterly bowed down by disgust that I hardly have the strength to lift the pen. The teachers' strike which seemed such a frightfully top- ping wheeze has turned out an absolutely rotten chiz. Six of the beaks who infest this particular grove of academe duly downed the chalk and mortar-board at the blink of dawn on Monday. Naturally, with half a dozen of the most fancied runners with- drawn from the Pedagogic Stakes, we as- sumed that the whole day's meeting was scratched and swarmed into the streets to show a bit of solidarity and all that sort of thing—only, when we eventually stag- gered back exhausted through the portals of sweetness and light, to be given an especially crisp six apiece by the Head Man himself, who, cackling with pedantic glee the while, told us we'd obviously misunder- stood the proper punctuation of "Teachers Strike." I mean, I say!'
Peter Peterson, with an extract of a letter from Jane Eyre to Mrs Reed: 'The haughty exit of Miss Scatcherd and her obsequious colleagues in rebellion, released us from all restraint. We poured, like Alaric's Goths, into the kitchen. Of Lowood's eighty pupils, sixty, infected by a putrid fever, were by now incapable of absorbing solid food; even Mr Brockle- urst's meagre rations provided an abund- nt feast of bread and cheese for the rest.
• ur appetites, for once, satisfied, we then epared bowls of nutritious pap for the valids, one of which I eagerly bore to den. Enquiring, however, whence came his delicate gruel, and discovering by my eply the unlicensed nature of its ingredients, he refused it, assuring me, with a smile, hat she should soon be where hunger was o more.'
nd finally honourable mention to Fergus orter's Eric and three guineas for D. S. aven's Edwin Russell: • • . kind Mr Rose's participation stabs Y heart. I said, weeping, that I honoured IS loyalty. "Loyalty?" he cried, tearing s hair; "abandoning my sacred trust? But least you, Edwin, absolve me!" Tears seaded down his cheeks as I left him raying in the Library.
myself offered the fags Euclid lessons, they refused—obviously distrusting my Pacity rather than through spiritual hebe- ude. But older fellows "supervise" us. At rst I rejoiced in learning Agamemnon ndisturbed; but alas! one suggestion ade to Eric made me flush with shame. broth-Hattaavah indeed! 0 Eric, if you ey!) More - they organise "educational xpeditions" to Dan's, where men swear and nk. May Eric instead gather wild-flowers Rh me to comfort Mr Rose's anguish!' Gutture Ovans
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