Madam, - RTÉ's abject failure to come up with anything vaguely resembling a serious contender, never mind a winner, in the Eurovision Song Contest is only compounded by "our own" Marty Whelan's inane wittering and whingeing about Baltic and Balkan vote-rigging.
The fact is that RTÉ has failed to appreciate two glaringly obvious developments in Eurovision. One, that the competition is increasingly about spectacular visuals and pyrotechnics; and two, that the outcome is largely determined by kids of the music DVD generation texting in their preferences.
For next year's contest in Belgrade, I suggest Macnas fronting the Celtic Tenors warbling over a drums and bass beat with a few fireworks thrown in for good measure. You could include a song (though I wouldn't recommend it). You might even, God forbid, win the wretched thing. - Yours, etc,
RICHARD WENTGES, Killucan, Co Westmeath.
Madam, - Two questions must be answered: How did the Serbs manage to clone Maureen Potter and who gave them permission? - Is mise,
RICHIE BYRNE, Monivea Road, Galway.
Madam, - Reading the report on Eurovision by Karen Fricker in Monday's edition one could be forgiven for thinking that the clocks had been turned back. Seeing Maria Serifovic described as "stocky and mannish" brought me back to my days of reading ideologically suspect Enid Blyton adventures.
Ms Fricker went on to say that Serifovic shared the stage with "five conventionally glamorous female backing singers". This unwieldy description presumably refers to the fact that the singers had long hair, hardly a newsworthy fact.
The only thing I can say in favour of Ms Fricker's report is that is was less insulting than that of Mark Savage, writing on the same subject for BBC News. He described six fully clothed women choreographed to touch each other lightly on the shoulder as "a slow-motion lesbian porn film".
One can only suppose Mr Savage has led a very sheltered life. - Yours, etc,
JANE O'ROURKE, Maxwell Street, Dublin 8.
Madam, - As Karen Fricker's report on Eurovision pointed out, the contest rules require instrumentalists to mime their performances. This must be an anathema to groups such as Dervish which thrive on live performance.
Bearing this in mind, what are we to make of the comment by RTÉ's Julian Vignoles that "they were better in the competition than they'd been in rehearsals all week . . ." Better at what, exactly? - Yours, etc,
PAUL MURPHY, Griffith Avenue, Dublin 9.
Madam, - I find some of the cheap jibes about John Waters following Eurovision rather distasteful. I wonder if the same people would write about female columnists in this way? And would such letters be published? - Yours, etc,
T KINDLON, Beechpark Lawn, Dublin 15.