Spectator Competition: Beg to differ

In Comp. 3350 you were invited to write a refutation of a well-known line from literature. Ian Jack once imagined quibbling with Jane Austen over ‘a truth universally acknowledged…’: ‘“Universally”, Miss Austen, even among pederasts with good fortunes, or among the heathen races?’ Poetry dominated, which is reflected in the winning entries (£25 to each). Pats on backs to Tracy Davidson, D.A. Prince, Nicholas Lee, Sylvia Fairley and others.

The unexamined life is most worth living:
I implore you, feel the gusto in the Now.
There’s so much to do, and Time is unforgiving,
You’ll never figure why we’re here, or how.
Leave experiences quite unmediated,
Surf that sense-data as if it were a wave;
There’s a world outside yourself you’ve underrated:
Don’t let introspection lull you to the grave.
It’s thumb-suckers’ comfort only, self-absorption,
Scrap those navel-gazing theories you revolve.
Face the world instead; it’s out of all proportion,
Like an ocean into which all selves dissolve.
Let examiners continue their dissections,
As they tear themselves apart, just turn away
For the Now is beckoning from all directions:
Come unblinking and unthinking out to play.