No. 1315: The winners

i.asPistos reports.. Competitors, given a first lie allegedly by Rupert Brooke, were asked complete a sonnet entitled 'On F tan Illegitimate ring that Wordsworth had had an Illegitimate Child'. I owe this competition to Mr Richard i'Lourtauld, who told me that it was original- Pet by Randolph Churchill in Time and e nearly 22 years ago and that the win- ng entrY. by a former chairman o. f White's and reputed to have been written in less than half an hour, still hangs in the club. I haven't contrived an occasion to in- spect it to compare this week's brilliance time and kindnes s.wltb Yester

' year's, but if any member has the ..

b There was no obligation to specify the bastard as Annette Vallon's or to make the 'Oohnet either Wordsworthian or Brookeish hur. for that matter, to bother about the im- 11`led. anachronism — Byron being alive at time of Wordsworth's indiscretion. The closest runners-up deserves mention: they preNoel Petty, Desmond, D. A. Prince, es avid Philips and George Moor ('What an veaPe that Highland Reaper had/Who ePt, born cannier than Gallic maids,/At a safe distance from the unwed dad!). The Inners below have £10 each, and the bonus bottle of Californian wine (Firestone Merlot Ambassador's Vineyard, 1979) will teach the hands of E. S. Goodwill, thanks

Neville Abraham of the Café des '"Ils du Vin, Covent Garden.

41'0roil! thou shouldst be living at this hour 4„cict another canto to Don Juan '14 Prof Laureate Willie, the true blue 'un, Prattled on about a springtime flower.

f

To %lowing has suddenly turned sour an

Attnet that in his lukeworm youth he knew te

'11 ifrancaise) from Orleans or Ouen, cl left her in the lurch, a child for dower. 10"`-' thee take thy pen and curl thy lip -rbsitliling scorn as the brisk octaves flow Fi'at welcome him to thy loose fellowship,

ay hint of dignity from head to toe,

And, for a final thrust, quote Baudelaire: Hail!, hypocrite! Mon semblable, mon frere!

(E. S. Goodwill) Byron! thou shouldst be living at this hour, Which turns thy famous junketings to nought, Countess Guiccioli to a pleasant thought, Thy incest to a passing April shower; Even Claire Clairmont's memory, like a flower, Fades with the daughter she so dearly bought; And vanished virtue may no more be sought, Which we had thought so safe in Wordsworth's power.

As Shakespeare commented, there is no art To tell the mind's construction from the face; He was a gentleman in whom to place Absolute trust, transparent as the day. Could he have put a French girl in the cart? And, goodness! what would Mrs Wordsworth

say?

Byron, thou shouldst be living at this hour! I am amazed by this I really am. I thought Wordsworth in love with field and flower.

When thou wert asked to fork out for a pram Was anyone surprised? But that old bard, Mooching around among th' lugubrious lakes, Who did he daily with? I find it hard To recast him as one of Nature's rakes.

Though poets must be intimate and frank They are — like lesser men — at pains to hide

Their sexual selves. Researchers first draw

blank

Investigating the licentious side.

He must have done it on a primrose bank! I'm stunned, but thou would'st take it in thy stride. (Ginger Jones)

Byron! thou shouldst be living at this hour! Some corner of a foreign land, 'twould seem, Is now forever Grasmere. Who could dream That he who sang the lake, the fell, the flower, And over lesser mortals seemed to tower, Could ape Don Juan? Yet he once did deem Blake's madness far more worthy of esteem Than Scott's and Byron's sanity and power!

Let's call him mad a while, then; who could blame Timid Childe William, far away and young, The land in ruins, all the laws unstrung, Snatching at life amid the smoke and flame? Still, nice to know it's not just lords who err. In bourgeois cupboard often skeletons stir.

(O. Banfield)

Byron! thou shouldst be living at this hour! For he who prated of emotion master'd And recollected in some tranquil bower Secreted all the while a little bastard! (Nay! Check thy bold, incestuous surmise! The lady friend on whom the sage begot The babe was French — all fire and flashing

eyes, Not — God forbid! — his doting sister, Dot.) Thus, while the hypocrite roam'd endless fells, Interminable vales and pastures hilly, And penn'd chaste odes to golden daffodils, His only thought was of his little Willie! 'Twould seem, then, the immortal line should rather Be render'd: 'Of the Child the Man is father.' (Paul Griffin) (Peter Norman)