Independent Pursuits: Creativity

THE ADVERTISING world is rocked to its foundations this week as creative types working only with a Chambers English Dictionary and no lunch budget provide literary slogans. Willie Waggledagger (as Len Clarke, between cups of tea, assures me is what they called the Bard at school) naturally provided the bulk of inspiration, from Paul Turner's Viagra- pumper "Much Ado About Nothing" to Michael Gifford's "Our Revels are now ended" (buy another pack). Duncan Bull promotes Kentucky Fried Chicken with "'Tis an ill cook that cannot lick his own fingers" and Tom Gaunt advertises the Rolling Stones' millionth tour with "Is this a Jagger that I see before me?"

Virgin Trains continue to glean the flak: Betty Steward (Hartston is on his way to Sock Shop, by the way...) likes Chesterton's "The only way to be sure of catching a train is to miss the one before it" and John O'Byrne quotes Milton's "They also serve who only stand and wait". Magy Higgs sees potential for the Rolex corporation in Andy Warhol's "Anybody can be famous for 15 minutes", and RJ Pickles helps out Mum deodorant with Wyatt's "They flee from me that sometime did me seek".

Mollie Caird harnesses Keats with "Oh Attic Shape! Fair Attitude!" (sensitive loft conversions by dedicated team of experts), as does Linda French, whose Alka Seltzer ad "My brain aches and a drowsy numbness pains my senses, as though of Carlsberg I had drunk" prompted all-too-familiar memories in this office. G Dobson wins a copy of Chambers with the Microsoft-Shelley tie-in "Look Upon my Works, ye mighty, and despair", and A Berry wins another for advertising Bill Clinton's defence lawyers with the immortal Kipling line "A woman is only a woman, but a good cigar is a smoke".

Nicholas E Gough provides this week's challenge, (and also notches up a magnificent 101 mentions in this column). You are asked to take a well known expression, change a single letter, and provide a definition for the new expression thereby attained. Bonk Fides, for instance, is safe sex; Haste Cuisine, fast French food; Raisin d'Etre, the fruit of one's loins. The above may be in foreign languages, but English is more than acceptable.

Suggestions to Creativity, The Independent, Features 18th Floor, 1 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London E14 5DL. The top two, or three if anyone has won one for suggesting the week's theme, will win a copy of Chambers Dictionary. Results two weeks from today.