Lucy Vickery

Shakespearean sonnet

In Competition No. 3077 you were invited to submit a sonnet with the name of a Shakespearean character hidden in each line This one pulled in a bumper haul of entries, from old hands and newcomers alike. While some competitors described the challenge as ‘fun’, others greeted it with a squeal of horror. C. Paul

Spectator competition winners: misguided love poems

You seemed to embrace the latest challenge – to supply seriously misguided love poems – especially wholeheartedly, and I admired your powers of invention in finding so many ways of making my toes curl. Even Brexit got a look-in: ‘Let me be your Brexit backstop/ I will never set you free…’ (Ian Barker). Dishonourable mentions

Bad romance

In Competition No. 3076 you were invited to submit seriously misguided love poems. You seemed to embrace this task especially wholeheartedly, and I admired your powers of invention in finding so many ways of making my toes curl. Even Brexit got a look-in: ‘Let me be your Brexit backstop/ I will never set you free…’ (Ian

Trumpian verse

In Competition No. 3075 you were invited to submit poems by Donald Trump.   The Beautiful Poetry of Donald Trump, which is the brainchild of Rob Sears, represents the fruits of Mr Sears’s efforts to find evidence of the President’s sensitive, poetic side in his tweets and transcripts. The verses in the book are stitched

Spectator competition winners: Franz Kafka goes phishing

The latest challenge was to submit a scam letter ghostwritten by a well-known author, living or dead. Falling for a scam is costly and tedious (and more easily done than you might think), but the comedian James Veitch found a silver lining when he decided to en-gage with his persecutors: the ensuing correspondence — lengthy,

We’re scamming

In Competition No. 3074 you were invited to submit a scam letter ghostwritten by a well-known author, living or dead.   Falling for a scam is costly and tedious (and more easily done than you might think), but the comedian James Veitch found a silver lining when he decided to engage with his persecutors: the

Neo-gothic

In Competition No. 3073 you were invited to submit a short story in the Gothic style with a topical twist.   The seed of this challenge was the recent reopening of Strawberry Hill House and Garden, the neo-Gothic creation of Horace Walpole, whose 1764 chiller The Castle of Otranto is regarded as the first Gothic

Spectator competition winners: a life in sixteen lines

The latest challenge, to supply a short verse biography of a well-known figure from history, produced a commendable entry in which notables long gone — Diotisalvi, Vercingetorix the Gaul, Dr Dee — rubbed shoulders with those still very much with us — Anthony Weiner, Donald Trump, Boris Johnson. There were borrowings from Edward Lear and

Brief lives

In Competition No. 3072 you were invited to supply a short verse biography of a well-known figure from history.   In a commendable entry, notables long gone — Diotisalvi, Vercingetorix the Gaul, Dr Dee — rubbed shoulders with those still very much with us — Anthony Weiner, Donald Trump, Boris Johnson. There were borrowings from

Spectator competition winners: Let’s get demotivated!

For the latest competition you were invited to supply a demotivational poem. This was your opportunity to come up with a bracing antidote to the worldview peddled by an eye-wateringly lucrative self-help industry that feeds on a mix of insecurity and the aspirational narcissism du jour. You came at the challenge from various angles, but

Accentuate the negative | 25 October 2018

In Competition No. 3071 you were invited to supply a demotivational poem.   This was your opportunity to come up with a bracing antidote to the world-view peddled by an eye-wateringly lucrative self-help industry that feeds on a mix of insecurity and the aspirational narcissism du jour.   You came at the challenge from various

Mary, Mary…

In Competition No. 3070 you were invited to provide a poem with the title ‘When I Grow Up I Want to Be [insert name here]’.   Performance poet Megan Beech was so incensed by the abuse heaped by Twitter trolls on her idol Mary Beard that she wrote a poem called ‘When I Grow Up

Favouritism

In Competition No. 3069 you were invited to provide a spoof version of the song ‘My Favourite Things’ for the constituency/demographic of your choice. I decided to set this comp after stumbling across the Rodgers and Hammerstein classic recast as it might have been sung by an elderly Julie Andrews (‘Maalox and nose drops and

Spectator competition winners: back-to-front sonnets

The latest competition asked for a sonnet in reverse, modelled on Rupert Brooke’s ‘Sonnet Reversed’, which turns upside-down both the form — it begins on the rhyming couplet — and the Petrarchan concept of idealised love, starting on a romantic high but ending in prosaic banality. This challenge produced a delightfully varied and engaging entry.

Back-to-front sonnet

In Competition No. 3068 you were invited to provide a sonnet in reverse, using as your model Rupert Brooke’s ‘Sonnet Reversed’, which turns upside-down both the form — it begins on the rhyming couplet — and the Petrarchan concept of idealised love, starting on a romantic high but ending in prosaic banality.   This challenge