Spectator competition: write a poem for the new royal baby (because the Poet Laureate won’t)

Carol Ann Duffy, the Poet Laureate, has again refused to write a poem to commemorate the birth of the new royal, Charlotte Elizabeth Diane. Rod Liddle has written his own poem about Duffy, asking why she took the job of Poet Laureate if she doesn’t like writing verse about royals.

But this still leaves no one around to write a verse befitting the occasion. So we are inviting Spectator readers to do so, and will make this the Spectator Literary Competition: it will be formally announced in next week’s magazine.

Please email entries of up to 16 lines to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 20 May.