"Drink Canada dry. Visit Expo 67." "Do the Chinese look in the White Pages?" "Goodnight, David . . . Goodnight, Goliath."

THESE riveting statements are among the entries in a graffiti contest we have just conducted in the cause of general amusement and TIME promotion. Of course, graffiti (from the Italian, meaning scratching or scribbling) have been seen on walls since antiquity, forming an enduring kind of subliterature. Recently they became a fad, appearing on lapel buttons, car stickers and on almost any available surface, including (as we found) TIME advertising posters.

To further free expression, our Promotion Department mailed out a supply of brand-new posters to members of advertising agencies, together with an invitation to let themselves go. Exactly 581 posters bearing inscriptions were returned to us, and duly examined by expert judges. Winning exhibits are now on display in New York's Grand Central Station. Naturally, many have an advertising slant: "The White Knight cheats at polo," "Pall Mall can't spall," "Avis is Hertz's Newsweek" "Xerox never comes up with anything original," and "I dreamed I could wear a Maidenform bra--Twiggy."." There is also the one about the two effeminate Braniff pilots, one of whom says to the other: "Look, Tony, you promised I could take the pink one up today."

Getting into the spirit, Columnist Art Buchwald recorded several graffiti from Washington: "Governor Romney--Would you buy a new car from this man?" "Adam Clayton Powell uses Man-Tan." "George Wallace uses hair straightener." "Walter Lippmann--God is not dead. He is alive and appearing twice a week in the Washington Post."

In the Los Angeles Times, Sports Columnist Jim Murray tried: "Cassius Clay is really Al Jolson," "Support your local police--bet with a bookie who buys protection," "Ronald Reagan for umpire."

One of the authorities on wall aphorisms is Robert Beckwith, a Columbia University student who conducts a monthly radio show dedicated to the art. His authentic collection includes: "Lock up McNamara and throw away the Ky," "Jean-Paul Sartre saves Green Stamps," and "The meek shall inherit the earth--they are too weak to refuse."

Everybody is getting into the act. Our cover subject for this week hazards: "General Sarnoff is really a corporal." And then again, the sculpture that Robert Berks did for our cover is bound to evoke an obvious if awful contribution from graffiti fanciers, and so we might as well be the first to say it: "Johnny Carson is a bust."

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