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  #1  
Unread 12-02-2016, 08:59 AM
Max Goodman Max Goodman is offline
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Default New Statesman comp ending

In Deep Drills, Sylvia, quoting the New Statesman posts this news about their weekly humor competition:

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Originally Posted by Sylvia Fairley View Post
Eagle-eyed readers will have noticed that we are not setting a new comp this week. That is because the NS Competition is ending for a period. We hope it may return at some point in the future, extra pagination permitting. ... [For now] No 4448 [is] the final comp set
Has the comp taken breaks before? (Someone here must know. Bill?) How concerned should we be that this is the final end of more than 85 years or comps?
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Unread 12-02-2016, 10:27 AM
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George Simmers George Simmers is offline
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This is lousy news. The comps have a splendid history, much of which is related in Bill Greenwell's blog: https://nscompsandpoets.wordpress.com/
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Unread 12-02-2016, 11:10 AM
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It appears they don't have the space. They need more room for those articles nobody really reads. What is the circulation now?

I just looked it up. Actually it's quite good at 33,000 and rising. (The Spectator is 71,000 and also rising.) So they have no excuse. Perhaps the comp is not sufficiently on message. Lefties don't want anyone rocking the leaky boat.

Last edited by John Whitworth; 12-02-2016 at 11:14 AM.
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Unread 12-02-2016, 11:20 AM
Adrian Fry Adrian Fry is offline
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It's about money, John: what is anything ever about but that?
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Unread 12-02-2016, 02:41 PM
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You mean the money for the prizes, Adrian? That's a bit pathetic but most (though not all)lefties are bloody tightwads, in my experience. The poet Kit Wright (not a leftie) always said getting a pint out of Roger McGough was like blood from a stone.

Actually Roger bought me a Becks once. At the BBC!
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Unread 12-04-2016, 04:11 PM
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Nicholas Stone Nicholas Stone is offline
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This is a bitter pill to swallow. The Lit Rev is gone already, the Oldie has cut its space, and the WaPo is frankly not quite the same as the British weekend comps. What on earth are they going to fill the space with? Another article? Why? Is £120 a week for prizes really too steep?

I am definitely going to write to the magazine editor about this. Surely the more of us point out the comp. is one of the best things about the Staggers the better?
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Unread 12-07-2016, 05:48 AM
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Default Comp breaks

Quote:
Originally Posted by Max Goodman View Post
In Deep Drills, Sylvia, quoting the New Statesman posts this news about their weekly humor competition:



Has the comp taken breaks before? (Someone here must know. Bill?) How concerned should we be that this is the final end of more than 85 years or comps?
The NS (orig Week-end Review) has never had a break. One of its comps was cancelled because all the entries blew out of the bike-basket of the judge (war-time), and one was banned (sexist gags) in the 80s, but later printed in a Xmas edition, decades later.

The Spectator's current comp, however, is numbered from the first issue in 1950, and was cancelled in 1959 at no. 472, and revived, without warning really, in 1967, with the next number in sequence.

Last edited by Bill Greenwell; 12-07-2016 at 06:58 AM.
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Unread 12-07-2016, 06:23 AM
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Oh well, only an eight year wait then.
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Unread 12-07-2016, 06:23 AM
Brian Allgar Brian Allgar is offline
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  #10  
Unread 12-07-2016, 06:24 AM
Brian Allgar Brian Allgar is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill Greenwell View Post
The Spectator's current comp, however, is numbered from the first issue in 1950, and was cancelled in 1959 at about no. 473, and revived, without warning really, in 1967, with the next number in sequence.
Good heavens! I discovered the Speccie competition, and had my first win, in 1967. No wonder I hadn't come across it before.
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