SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 19

Report by Mervyn Horder

A prize of £5 was offered for a description of a journey up Regent Street in the style of Charles M. Doughty, H. M. Tomlinson, Sacheverell Sitwell, Peter Fleming, Herodotus, Godfrey Winn, or the scriptwriter of an American travelogue.

Competitors seem to have found matter easier than manner. A long succession of those very puppets I expected to have dangled in front of me were duly dangled and gratefully recognised : Godfrey Winn interrogating a little old lady dressed in faded lavender on the steps of a church (W. Spafford) ; Peter Fleming in the company of " an Old Etonian in all but name " found through the agony column of The Times (J. F. Powell) ; Herodotus puzzled about buses (" their bellies filled with what I suppose to be malefactors "-z- E. H. Whitford-Hawkey) and the operation of traffic lights ; and the American commentator confusing Beau Brummel with Bow Bells (D. R. Peddy). But mere recognisability is not enough, and too few competitors managed to describe their scenes and characters

in the authentic accents of the chosen master. .

Those styles where manner counts for at least as much as matter (Doughty, Sitwell, Tomlinson, Fleming) had few successful practi- tioners ; the most commonly attempted were the less elusive Hero- dotus, Godfrey Winn and the American. I was particularly sorry that no one came near to hitting off Tomlinson, whose wistful, world-is-too-much-with-us flavour I should have thought easy to achieve in this context ; and the low general quality of the Flemings leads me to suppose that the weekly drama criticisms in this journal are not as widely read as they should be.

Fortunately, when it comes to prize-giving, J. Le May's Doughty is outstanding, and receives the lion's share, three pounds. A pound each also to D. I. Beaumanoir-Hart (Sacheverell Sitwell), who has aimed high and kept it up pretty well, and to C. Shaw (Godfrey Winn), who is unkind, but not unfunny. Highly commended are P. M. Lewis (Herodotus) and W. J. Carson (American Travelogue). Winning entries:

FIRST PRIZE

(JEAN LE MAY)

Languishing now, in the hot mid-day, I sought noon-shelter, where I might break my fast: and passed the swelling curve, the façade over- laid with blossoming plants ; of how much amorous contentment to my parched eyes! Entered I betimes a coffee-house ; here was but the deadly semblance of hospitality. "Go to!" quoth the damsel (she bearing a greasy clout)—" Here are many come before thee!" So I beturned me, glad of the street-air ; wondering of the report of this hostess which passing strangers may sow in the country. Then spied

I a fruit-seller across the way, and achieved to cross to him ; the passage was nineteen paces, hastily trod. I desired of the merchant oranges, and gave coins. "So little!" (said he) " Put to! put to !" More I gave, whereupon—" As I live!" (he cried) "This is a scurvy trick!"— and spurned me with impudent glare. I perceived I had tendered, I wot not how, an half-piastre ; and speedily replaced it with coin of the realm. "Traffic not with spivs" (the grown street-Aarab) exclaimed a bystander, " I warn thee, they will not think, in a lonely way, to slit thy wesand."

SECOND PRIZES

(D. I. BEAUMANOIR-HART) A necropolis in the tortured sooty cliffs of twentieth-century Commer- cial Baroque, this is Regent Street.

The buildings rear up, column, architrave, frieze and cornice, a riot of all the orders ; scrolled, whorled, carved and pedimented—a museum of architectural bad taste.

Beauty of form and line one sees only in the fleshing stream of motor traffic. Slim sports cars dart past like baby carp ; limousines like swans glide exquisitely past their own reflection in a thousand plate-glass windows. All are heraldically bright, with metal en tincture and tincture on metal ; gold, argent, gules, azure, sable, vert. The heavy buses surge forward and are halted like a charge of Rupert's cavalry faced by Cromwell and his scarlet troopers advancing to the kill.

I wish that Fate would transport me to.the Regent Street of 1812, wide, gay and modish, its elegant air enhanced by the burnished equipage of the Prince himself, lifting his gloved hand to his gorgeous hat, poised on one of Truefitt's nutty wigs, and, oppasite to him, Beauty in cerulean satin, decked with pearls and plumes. (CouN SHAw) " God bless your lordship," I said to an elderly peer who was standing on the edge of the pavement, trying to sell a set of egg-covers which his aunt, a Countess in her own right, had knitted. He smiled proudly and

I reflected how typical he was of the new Britain which we, the ordinary simple folk, are building here in our island home. I reached the glorious sweeping curve and stood gazing up towards Oxford Street and down towards the busy hum of Piccadilly Circus. A few feet away from me, a young girl was doing the same. Suddenly she turned to me, describing the scene in words peculiar to her generation, " Lovely, isn't it ? " and I reflected how typical the was of the new Britain which we, the ordinary simple folk, are building in our island home. I drew nearer to Oxford Street and paused in front of a travel agency. A burly man in honest tweeds was staring into the window. " Of yeoman stock ? " I asked. " Manchester," he answered, a slow glow of a smile spreading over his features, " and proud of it." And I knew that the heart of England was in the right place.

(Next week:—Scotland Road, Liverpool.)