THE RAGTOP RAG

While reading Emily Young’s piece about Tom Matano (“Boy Meets Car,” Style, March 13), we were surprised at all the kudos bestowed on him for “conceiving” the Miata while the Lotus Elan he used to “re-create the sports car he never had the chance to own” was not mentioned. The 33-year-old “jaunty little” Elan, originally designed by Colin Chapman, served not only as a muse but also as the blueprint for the sports car now atop Matano’s resume.

CLAY AND PATTI VYZRALEK

El Segundo

Mazda’s Matano fatuously confuses his Miata design with that of a real roadster. Perhaps the squint of its laughably unfortunate grille was intended to emulate the happy-face smile of the old Austin-Healey Sprite. Surely, nothing else, from the ignore-me curve of the Miata’s side paneling to the flabbiness of its I’m-really-just-a-sedan rear, invokes any comparison to the likes of the rigorously hewed Triumphs and sweepingly contoured Jaguars it yens to be.

Not comparison, but contrast: Put a TR-6 or an XKE next to the pillbug Miata and, even in these days with our eyes no longer accustomed to ragtop beauty, you can instantly tell the genuine from the fake.

KIM WILLIAMSON

Los Angeles

Editor’s note: Williamson was the last auto writer of the Los Angeles Herald Examiner.