Competition No 3774
Set by Margaret Rogers, 24 March
We asked you what you thought Bush, Chirac, Blair et al could learn from Richard Olivier's courses using the Bard.
Report by Ms de Meaner
Thoopah. £20 to the winners. All hail, John O'Byrne, who also gets the Tescos.
Hi. Today: the insolence of office. (Takes out proactive attendance monitor laser-guided stylus.) Present but not correct, right? OK guys, warm-up. What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter? Thatcher? Good try, Blair. Next? What's that, Chirac, a veto? Right, confiscated. They in France of the best rank and station are most select and generous? I give you station, maybe. Putin? The silent type . . . Putin, are you a Muscovy duck? Or just a king of infinite space? Ah, Bush minor. Shock'n'Awe, eh? Words, words, words: first mouthed, to be last swallowed. Berlusconi - you're more an antique Roman, any answers? (Throws switch on overhead multi-disciplinary interactivity conferencing screen.) The pasta-maker? 'Tis a loving and a fair reply. But wrong. The answer is "grave-maker" - could have been gallows-maker, surprised you missed that, Bush mi - but let us hold the mirror up to nature, and make an inventory of graves. An inventory, Bush mi? A list, list, O, list! Yes? "If we drop bombs, are we hoist with our own petard?" That is the question: 45 minutes. Cudgel thy brains. The rest is silence. Take out your laptops.
Bill Greenwell
"Tennis balls, my liege." Words, gentlemen, which might have changed history, if King Henry had responded more wisely. Think back to our Incrementally Negotiated Conflict Resolution Model. Henry was well aware that the Dauphin's offer left many thousands of tennis balls unaccounted for, including Slazengers and Wilsons, which could one day be used against English players at Roland Garros and elsewhere. Nor was there any mention of rackets. True, Henry had demanded the right to rule France, but a ton of tennis balls was a decent start. He had not exhausted all diplomatic channels, not least with the French royal family. Speaking of whom, in the final scenes we discover what even the embedded Chorus was unable to report. The casus belli was not, in fact, a few tennis balls or the "liberation" of "some certain dukedoms", or even oil, except perhaps a soupcon of French dressing in the shape of Princess Katherine of France. So, gentlemen, if there is something we should know about that nice anthrax lady in Saddam's cabinet, now might be a good time to share it with us. Who'd like to go first?
David Silverman
In today's case study we will examine that unfortunate prince of the market, Hamlet - a classic case of failed strategic-business decision-maker. Many of you will recognise his dilemma: selecting the right time to commit resources ("To invest, or not to invest . . ."). It takes him nine soliloquies to act decisively, by which time there's blood all over the floor - a lot of it his! Nothing but negative returns. The signals suggest that he was badly positioned in a marketing sense, paralysed by unrealistic dreams, second-guessing and inaccurate cross-sectional data estimates ("How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world"). So observe the dangers of economic simplification. Why is this guy, who must have received a fairly good business studies degree from Wittenberg, plagued by doubts? First, he was without an Analytical Revenge Model ("There is nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so"). Second, he lacked the required ruthless rhetoric of the charismatic entrepreneur ("O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I"; "There's a divinity that shakes our ends"). Finally, his demise has a lot to do with poor organisation on the castle floor ("The time is out of joint"). The rest is silence, I'm afraid. Tomorrow we'll look at inadequate pension planning in King Lear.
John O'Byrne
Right, gentlemen. It's unfortunate you missed the first module of this course: assassination tactics. And learning how Cassius brought together disparate elements by dubious means - bribery, threats - would undoubtedly have helped get that second UN resolution on the books. Now we proceed to self-confidence, especially in adversity.
"Our doubts are traitors." YOU are in the right. Doubters are subordinate characters: tradesmen, drunken soldiery, Roman citizens. Let's start today with some oratory so you see how easy it is to influence such people. Tony will read Brutus's speech, a noble, honest man not fully convinced he's on the right side. Note the body language. Then Mark Antony, the first spinner. Jacques, see how, by abandoning self-doubt and by drawing attention to palpable weakness in those who have dared to act, you can sway your audience "to rise and mutiny". You still have your options open. Keep them that way. And remember, deaths have to be milked for all they're worth. We'll get on to battle tactics and the politics of victory next session. Now, speak to camera. Let's go, Tony.
G McIlraith
No 3777 Set by Brendan O'Byrne
"Jestation: that pregnant pause between joke and punchline." We want at least ten homophones of existing words, plus their new definitions.
Max 200 words by 25 April E-mail: comp@newstatesman.co.uk
