The Funniest Bulwer Lytton Fiction Contest Entries – Description
“It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness”
The Bulwer Lytton Fiction Contest is a tongue-in-cheek contest held annually and is sponsored by the English Department of San Jose State University in San Jose, California. Entrants are invited “to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels” – that is, deliberately bad
The contest was started in 1982 by Professor Scott E. Rice of the English Department at San Jose State University and is named for English novelist and playwright Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, author of the much-quoted first line “It was a dark and stormy night”. This is the opening from the 1830 novel Paul Clifford
These are the entries (winners and dishonourable mentions) from the year 2002 to 2017 which I personally find funny or clever in some way.
From his bare feet and the wooden club he carried everywhere, to the bear skin that he wore over his stooped body even while the opposition donned pinstriped suits. criminal defense attorney Alonzo Cloodwick, bearded and sorely in need of barbering, seemed like something of a throwback to an earlier generation.
Some stories are so compelling they almost seem to write themselves, but not this one.
Our tale begins with the encounter of two gentlemen; I’m going to describe the second gentleman first.
“I have always found character introductions at the beginning of novels to be a rather clunky literary device,” said Edmond Wordswell of Liston Street, Cambridge, a 39-year-old tax attorney and sufferer of severe lactophobia, the tragic result of having been abandoned in an empty milk bottle carrier as an infant.
Special agent Mark Park’s strong chin and firm mouth showed that he was a man to be reckoned with, while his twinkling blue eyes revealed surprising depths of kindness and humor, the scar on his cheek a past filled with violence and danger, and his left ear a fondness for M and Ms, but only the red ones.
The tiny boat got tossed around on the ocean like a pinball in a pinball game played by a player who was really good at hitting all of those bumper things to get a really high score.
His hat fit his head as snugly as a manhole cover does the thing it fits into.
Kathy, who had bound her breasts and cropped her hair, and lied about her gender to join a monastery of Jesuits in northern Kentucky, until she was discovered one night in the shower, winced as the dentist pulled her tooth.
Yet again Imelda was exacerbated, or at least she assumed she was, as she was never sure exactly what the term meant though when she felt bloated and crampy as she was now, she was pretty sure she was, exacerbated that is.
My tongue moistened my parched lips and my stomach started to churn as I hungrily admired Leslie’s hair, which loosely resembled my great aunt Betty’s daughter Cornelia’s famous tuna casserole – brown, dry and crisp around the edges, yellow and creamy in the center with just a hint of grease spilling out over the top.
“Send an ambulance; I’m glistening profusely … bosom heaving . . . luscious, ripe orbs threatening to burst the seams of my black lace bodice … pulse galloping apace like a knight’s sleek steed … exquisite pain radiating down my graceful, alabaster arm, shooting upward to the finely chiseled jaw … I shall swoon – oh, my address?” the romance writer gasped into the phone before collapsing.
“I know what you’re thinking, punk,” hissed Wordy Harry to his new editor, “you’re thinking, ‘Did he use six superfluous adjectives or only five?’ – and to tell the truth, I forgot myself in all this excitement; but being as this is English, the most powerful language in the world, whose subtle nuances will blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel loquacious?’ – well do you, punk?”
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