Dunno why, but this stuff just cracks me up. I'm sure there are a few
here who will enjoy this:
Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest
2009 Results
"Folks say that if you listen real close at the height of the full
moon, when the wind is blowin' off Nantucket Sound from the nor' east
and the dogs are howlin' for no earthly reason, you can hear the awful
screams of the crew of the "Ellie May," a sturdy whaler Captained by
John McTavish; for it was on just such a night when the rum was
flowin' and, Davey Jones be damned, big John brought his men on deck
for the first of several screaming contests."
David McKenzie
Federal Way, WA
The winner of 2009 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest is David McKenzie, a
55-year-old Quality Systems consultant and writer from Federal Way,
Washington. A contest recidivist, he has formerly won the Western and
Children's Literature categories.
David McKenzie is the 27th grand prize winner of the contest that
began at San Jose State University in 1982.
An international literary parody contest, the competition honors the
memory (if not the reputation) of Victorian novelist Edward George
Earl Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873). The goal of the contest is childishly
simple: entrants are challenged to submit bad opening sentences to
imaginary novels. Although best known for "The Last Days of
Pompeii" (1834), which has been made into a movie three times,
originating the expression "the pen is mightier than the sword," and
phrases like "the great unwashed" and "the almighty dollar," Bulwer-
Lytton opened his novel Paul Clifford (1830) with the immortal words
that the "Peanuts" beagle Snoopy plagiarized for years, "It was a dark
and stormy night."
Most entries are submitted electronically through the Contest's Web
site: http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/.
Amonst them a few of my favourites:
The wind dry-shaved the cracked earth like a dull razor--the double
edge kind from the plastic bag that you shouldn't use more than twice,
but you do; but Trevor Earp had to face it as he started the second
morning of his hopeless search for Drover, the Irish Wolfhound he had
found as a pup near death from a fight with a prairie dog and nursed
back to health, stolen by a traveling circus so that the monkey would
have something to ride.
Warren Blair
Ashburn, VA
and this gem/masterpiece:
In a flurry of flame and fur, fangs and wicker, thus ended the world's
first and only hot air baboon ride.
Tony Alfieri
Los Angeles, CA
Sometimes I laugh so hard it hurts....enjoy!
r
Robatoy wrote:
> Dunno why, but this stuff just cracks me up. I'm sure there are a few
> here who will enjoy this:
>
>
> Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest
> 2009 Results
>
> "Folks say that if you listen real close at the height of the full
> moon, when the wind is blowin' off Nantucket Sound from the nor' east
> and the dogs are howlin' for no earthly reason, you can hear the awful
> screams of the crew of the "Ellie May," a sturdy whaler Captained by
> John McTavish; for it was on just such a night when the rum was
> flowin' and, Davey Jones be damned, big John brought his men on deck
> for the first of several screaming contests."
>
> David McKenzie
> Federal Way, WA
>
> The winner of 2009 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest is David McKenzie, a
> 55-year-old Quality Systems consultant and writer from Federal Way,
> Washington. A contest recidivist, he has formerly won the Western and
> Children's Literature categories.
> David McKenzie is the 27th grand prize winner of the contest that
> began at San Jose State University in 1982.
>
> An international literary parody contest, the competition honors the
> memory (if not the reputation) of Victorian novelist Edward George
> Earl Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873). The goal of the contest is childishly
> simple: entrants are challenged to submit bad opening sentences to
> imaginary novels. Although best known for "The Last Days of
> Pompeii" (1834), which has been made into a movie three times,
> originating the expression "the pen is mightier than the sword," and
> phrases like "the great unwashed" and "the almighty dollar," Bulwer-
> Lytton opened his novel Paul Clifford (1830) with the immortal words
> that the "Peanuts" beagle Snoopy plagiarized for years, "It was a dark
> and stormy night."
>
>
> Most entries are submitted electronically through the Contest's Web
> site: http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/.
>
> Amonst them a few of my favourites:
>
> The wind dry-shaved the cracked earth like a dull razor--the double
> edge kind from the plastic bag that you shouldn't use more than twice,
> but you do; but Trevor Earp had to face it as he started the second
> morning of his hopeless search for Drover, the Irish Wolfhound he had
> found as a pup near death from a fight with a prairie dog and nursed
> back to health, stolen by a traveling circus so that the monkey would
> have something to ride.
>
> Warren Blair
> Ashburn, VA
>
> and this gem/masterpiece:
>
> In a flurry of flame and fur, fangs and wicker, thus ended the world's
> first and only hot air baboon ride.
>
From memory:
"The senator must've really tied one on last night," remarked Sheriff
Doppleganger, "he left the party about 11:00 p.m. and this morning his car
was found in the smokestack of a British aircraft carrier in the Formosa
Straits."
"Remember children, kitten in the left hand, skinning knife in the right."
Amber had but one thought her first day on the job at the Pentagon: "Amber,
staple; Amber, staple; Amber, staple..."
Ripping the third bodice from Laura's hot, palpitating body, Lord Threthwitt
realized that he had also removed four camisoles, six petticoats, and five
pairs of pantaloons so far and there still seemed a lot of linen ahead, and
with a cry of passion demanded, "Good God, woman, are you nothing by
skivvies?"
And, to bring it back on topic:
"The toilet's stopped up again!' screeched Esmeralda Fnark in a voice that
had failed to endear her to over fifteen men in the past three years."