Should log competitions be banned?

[dgadee]

Just looking at a winning log in a competition - won't say where. It's not great or even mediocre literature, and not really sure it would be of much use if you wanted to follow on. And dates! Who wants to know it was the 13th of whatever month that you went somewhere and it was closed so you went somewhere else. Really, clubs ought to be trying to up their game by organizing creative writing classes. In my opinion.

I think I've been affected by all that Maurice Griffiths and period writing I've been reading.

 

[mrming]

I don’t know what a log competition is, but I do know you can’t beat a bit of MG. I recently stuck the The Magic of the Swatchways in front of an older family member who is a writer, and grew up sailing dinghies on the Colne and Blackwater in the 1950s. Needless to say he took the book home to finish it.

 

[Minerva]

Just looking at a winning log in a competition - won't say where. It's not great or even mediocre literature, and not really sure it would be of much use if you wanted to follow on. And dates! Who wants to know it was the 13th of whatever month that you went somewhere and it was closed so you went somewhere else. Really, clubs ought to be trying to up their game by organizing creative writing classes. In my opinion.

I think I've been affected by all that Maurice Griffiths and period writing I've been reading.

Tend to agree. I’d like to be able write more entertaining logs - but reading them back after the event I even bore myself!

Never thought about creative writing course to improve though. I’ll add that to the “someday” list when life is a little less hectic!

 

[dgadee]

I don’t know what a log competition is, but I do know you can’t beat a bit of MG. I recently stuck the The Magic of the Swatchways in front of an older family member who is a writer, and grew up sailing dinghies on the Colne and Blackwater in the 1950s. Needless to say he took the book home to finish it.

If you like him then can I suggest Alker Tripp and E.K.Chatterton's 'Down Channel with Vivette'.

 

[ylop]

If the “winning” entry was dull - does it suggest that it might have been the only entry? I’ve not seen a log written up like that since the pre-internet days when clubs used to publish paper magazines and annual reports and needed content… surely no sailing club is still expending volunteer resources on stuff nobody reads?

 

[johnalison]

I don’t know about competitions, but logs written in club magazines are mostly tedious. I used to try and subvert my submissions by writing them as a parody, or in verse, but my limited writing skills always held me back. Almost always they take the form of “We did this, then we did that”, which seldom holds my attention, even when it is about a place that I know and am interested in.

 

[RunAgroundHard]

I am not a fan of banning in general. I think they are a legacy from an earlier time , when a passage from Rhu to Campbeltown was a significant undertaking and club members were suitably impressed by the narrative; maybe even encouraged to have a go.

 

[sigma38dave]

I used to have to judge the entrants to a ‘best ships log’ trophy awarded at an annual dinner.

Luckily we usually only got one entry which meant I could avoid the painful process of actually reading it and award it fairly on merit.

 

[dgadee]

I am not a fan of banning in general. I think they are a legacy from an earlier time , when a passage from Rhu to Campbeltown was a significant undertaking and club members were suitably impressed by the narrative; maybe even encouraged to have a go.

You need a narrative, not a diary.

One coming up in club online mag is very good. Falmouth to Forth delivery. Not a date. A gale (MG echos!) and written very well. Most are just tedious.

 

[johnalison]

You need a narrative, not a diary.

One coming up in club online mag is very good. Falmouth to Forth delivery. Not a date. A gale (MG echos!) and written very well. Most are just tedious.

I once wrote a very fine one, if I say so myself. I gave an account of our Dutch cruise as if being recalled while on the return leg from Belgium. Unfortunately, the lady who look of the editorship took it upon herself to edit my submission, adding and removing punctuation, and changing some of the tenses. The result was complete gobbledygook that nobody understood, and I was a wee bit peeved.

 

[dgadee]

I once wrote a very fine one, if I say so myself. I gave an account of our Dutch cruise as if being recalled while on the return leg from Belgium. Unfortunately, the lady who look of the editorship took it upon herself to edit my submission, adding and removing punctuation, and changing some of the tenses. The result was complete gobbledygook that nobody understood, and I was a wee bit peeved.

The curse of the editor. I wonder how many of them know what real sailing literature is like.

The crew used to do very funny ones of our trip to the Med (I was the baddie for some reason) which were literate. She entered the club competition every year and would be given a special award for being the best non log. I never understood that thinking but a series of judges made the same decision. One or two big sailing names, too. The real winning logs were tedious.