Prose That Will Live In Infamy Fiction Contest Heralds A Novel Approach To Bad Writing

Bad was good Monday as the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest announced its annual awards for prose abuse.

The contest, sponsored by San Jose State University, seeks the most appalling opening sentence to an imaginary novel. Up to 10,000 people from all over the world do their worst to win that glory and fame, not to mention a cheap word processor.

The contest abuses the memory of Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, a 19th-century English novelist whose book “Paul Clifford” begins, “It was a dark and stormy night.” The novel goes downhill from there.

Here are some of the winners:

Grand prize: “Ace, watch your head!” hissed Wanda urgently, yet somehow provocatively, through red, full, sensuous lips, but he couldn’t, you know, since nobody can actually watch more than part of his nose or a little cheek or lips if he really tries, but he appreciated her warning.” - From Janice Estey, Aspen, Colo.

Historical: Ulysses Simpson Grant, having just finished a meal of Virginia ham, stretched out in his underwear of Mississippi-grown cotton, puffed heavily on a Georgia cigar, swilled straight bourbon whiskey, and thought how good it was to be in the Union Army.” From Albert Klar Ogden, Stansbury Park, Utah.

Urban realism: “The city at night has a million stories, like the woman who, even now, was weeping over the bloody corpse of her lover lying where she had slashed him from neck to kneecap, or the 12-year-old kid prostrate on the sidewalk after a drug deal gone wrong, or the babe, desperate to find the stuff that stopped your dress from sticking to your legs after you ironed it and couldn’t find a convenience store at this black hour in a city without a name.” From Michael Davies, Mississauga, Ontario.

Romance: “The flash of lightning startled her - making her breasts heave, and in that instant of white light she thought of how M-, her young lover from the estate’s cheese works, had so marveled at the creamy globes so delicately laced with blue veins that he had called the one Bleu and the other Stilton, and she reflected that she would never hear those sweet words again - at least not in the context, for come tomorrow she would be Lady Vile-Conundrum.” From D.J. Pass, Prospect, Nova Scotia.

Purple Prose: “Nigel lifted his Mont Blanc pen and held it in brief repose as he gazed past the conflagrative crackling of the fire in the hearth, through the triple-plate bay window, watching the incandescence of the twinkling stars like the detonation of a million flashbulbs, and the preponderance of frothy snowflakes blanketing the earth as creamily as marshmallow fluff, then, refreshed and inspired, he began to compose his annual Christmas form letter.” From Linda Gauer, Norton, Ohio.

Dishonorable Mention, Pun: “Baron Frankenstein looked up from his sewing, smiled benignly across the laboratory at his similarly engaged creation and protege and called, ‘Yes, yes! Put on a happy face; tonight will be your first date with the rest of your wife!” From Anthony Buckland, of North Vancouver, Canada.