[Chris O'Carroll]

Bill Greenwell has launched an online research project that traces nearly a century of New Statesman competitions. (The magazine has been publishing since 1913, and added the weekly competition in 1934, when it absorbed another journal in which the comp was a regular feature.) The site is so new that it was only up to the sixth comp last time I took a look. You'll find, among other items of interest, winning entries, judges' comments, Bill's own commentary, and glimpses of competitors who were rocking out with the Usual Suspects years before Greenwell, Ransome-Davies, et al. joined the band.

http://nscompsandpoets.wordpress.com/

It's going to be a lot of fun watching this site develop. And we can hope that it will occupy a great deal of Bill's time and attention that he might otherwise devote to outdoing the rest of us in today's competitions.

[John Whitworth]

Cripes, this is marvellous. Keep at it Bill. We watch and wonder! You might not believe it but I took the New Statesman for years when Paul Johnson was editor. It was that arsehole Crossman who cured me of the habit.

[George Simmers]

I'm following Bill's blog with keen interest.
An addition to the comp anthologies he mentions:
Bank Holiday on Parnassus, by Allan M. Laing.
Laing was the Greenwell of the 1930s and 40s, the most consistently successful competitor, under a number of names. Bank Holiday on P collects a range of his entries, many still entertaining.
My interest in Laing developed when I found he was a conscientious objector, imprisoned in Wormwood Scrubs during WW1. He wrote 'Carols of a Convict', describing his incarceration in jaunty rhyme. For example:

Crumpled Roseleaves: Speculations on the eve of discharge

So long from morning couch have I
Rolled out upon the floor,
That when I go where beds are high,
Say, two-feet-six or more,
I wonder if I still shall try
To roll out on the floor.

I’ve grown so used to talk in winks
With wary sidelong glance,
That when the watchful warder-lynx
No more’s a circumstance,
I fear my friends will say: “He drinks,”
Met by that sidelong glance.

And when the constitutional mile
With comrades I shall walk,
I wonder if in single file,
All solemnly we’ll stalk,
As is the weary Wormwood style,
The Scrubsian morning walk.

Shall I insist on scrubbing floors,
And hanging bedding out,
Freed from the stimulating roars
That used to fly about?
Such doubts defeat the pleasure sweet
I feel in going out.

If you're interested in Laing, I've written a bit more about him here.

[Brian Allgar]

Originally Posted by Chris O'Carroll

It's going to be a lot of fun watching this site develop. And we can hope that it will occupy a great deal of Bill's time and attention that he might otherwise devote to outdoing the rest of us in today's competitions.

Nah, he'll simply delegate the competition entries to Will Bellenger et al.

[Bill Greenwell]

Thanks, Nicholas ...