[Nigel Mace]

Nemo is correct to complain. I also take exception to the phrasing employed in the post "Cathy's Picks", where some posters, with whose viewpoints one judge disagreed, are described as persons...

who, based on the sonnets chosen as finalists, rather churlishly whined about being most horribly assailed by wistful sentimentality and dollops of treacly nostalgia (underline added)

The remark is both ad hominem and inaccurate. I read nobody as 'whining' nor do I recall any 'dollops of treacly' nostalgia being complained of. I, like Nemo to my recollection, did find some of the poems, in my case particularly "The Last Dance", overly sentimental and some of the other poems - not all the poems chosen as finalists - overly concerned with nostalgia. Those are still my opinions. Am I disallowed from holding them - or is doing so to be characterised as 'churlish' and 'whining'?

I'd also like to point out that my own selection included the winner which I placed second; that my choice for first place was also that of the other judge (and came fourth overall) and that my choice of third was also the third place choice of the other judge. My evaluations of order do not seem to be so far adrift - and I think it unfortunate that a judge's final report should have been used ex cathedra to denigrate the attitudes of site members whose views are not agreed with.

That judges have an extremely difficult task is clear and I, like everybody else, am suitably grateful that they give so much time and effort to it - and even more so where difficult personal circumstances have increased that burden. The bake-off is nothing without both them and all the entrants - but it is also nothing without the free expression of the critical views of the site's members, who, however, much they may disagree with views held by a judge, should be respected.

Lest this post be similarly characterised, may I add that what I started off with the intention of posting, before I had read "Cathy's Picks" in detail, was a suggestion that, either through the good offices of the site or on the initiative of the Hon. Menshs themselves, it would be extremely helpful if, out of so splendidly large a field, we might have sight of more of the sonnets - a potential doubling of our pleasure and of our chances for critical appraisal. Could that be done - jointly or severally? I hope it goes without need for further elabioration that I warmly congratulate all the poets selected and especially the winners.