Letter to the games page

Sir: So William Hartston wonders why fine minds at the Mind Sports Olympiad do not offer their services to the London Underground ("No Rest From Mental Fight", 23 August). Is he suggesting that this or any other institution would welcome the intrusion of intellect?

Applied brain-power would subvert the great British conspiracy of mediocrity, upsetting, quite dreadfully, the tribe of self-serving fools, liars, villains, incompetents and heads of water companies who preserve both status and salary by never employing anyone more intelligent than themselves.

Playing silly games is an excellent antidote to the chronic disbelief, frustration and low achievement we wisely visit upon the truly clever. Furthermore, such pointless activity renders them harmless and slightly ridiculous.

I, though no Einstein, began memorising the Bible backwards and in Sanskrit when Margaret Thatcher, fresh from her first victory, declared overt brains to be dangerously unpatriotic. How wonderful to know that there are people out there just like me. It's life, Will, but not as you know it.

MEGAN HEATHER

Dundee