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Annually, the English department at San Jose State University, the university back in my hometown, runs a contest of international acclaim that rewards bad writing, whether it be intentional or otherwise.
My mother forwarded an e-mail to me of the results of this year's contest, and below are the top ten (or worst ten, depending on your perspective) of the 2002 competition...
Enjoy!!
Cheers,
William
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Subject: Bulwer-Lyton Awards
>
> For those of you who do not know, Bulwer-Lytton wrote
> "The Last Days
> of Pompeii, which opens with the
> famous line "It was a dark and stormy night." Hence the following
> contest.
> These are the 10 winners of this year's Bulwer-Lytton contest (run
> by the English Dept of San Jose State
> University), wherein one writes only the first line of a
> bad novel.
>
> 10) "As a scientist, Throckmorton knew that if he were
> ever to break
> wind in the echo chamber, he would
> never hear the end of it."
>
> 9) "Just beyond the Narrows the river widens."
>
> 8) "With a curvaceous figure that Venus would have
> envied, a tanned,
> unblemished oval face framed with
> lustrous thick brown hair, deep azure-blue eyes fringed with long
> black lashes, perfect teeth that vied for
> competition, and a small straight nose, Marilee had a beauty that
> defied description."
>
> 7) "Andre, a simple peasant, had only one thing on his mind as he
> crept along the East wall: 'Andre creep...
> Andre creep... Andre creep.'"
>
> 6) "Stanislaus Smedley, a man always on the cutting edge of
> narcissism, was about to give his body and
> soul to a back alley sex-change surgeon to become the woman he
> loved."
>
> 5) "Although Sarah had an abnormal fear of mice, it did
> not keep her
> from eeking out a living at a local pet
> store."
>
> 4) "Stanley looked quite bored and somewhat detached, but then,
> penguins often do."
>
> 3) "Like an over-ripe beefsteak tomato rimmed with cottage cheese,
> the corpulent remains of Santa Claus
> lay dead on the hotel floor."
>
> 2) "Mike Hardware was the kind of private eye who didn't know the
> meaning of the word 'fear'; a man who
> could laugh in the face of danger and spit in the eye of
> death -- in
> short, a moron with suicidal tendencies."
>
> AND THE WINNER IS...
>
> 1) "The sun oozed over the horizon, shoved aside darkness, crept
> along the greensward, and, with sickly
> fingers, pushed through the castle window, revealing the pillaged
> princess, hand at throat, crown asunder,
> gaping in frenzied horror at the sated, sodden amphibian lying
> beside her, disbelieving the magnitude of
> the frog's deception, screaming madly, 'You lied!'"
My mother forwarded an e-mail to me of the results of this year's contest, and below are the top ten (or worst ten, depending on your perspective) of the 2002 competition...
Enjoy!!
Cheers,
William
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Subject: Bulwer-Lyton Awards
>
> For those of you who do not know, Bulwer-Lytton wrote
> "The Last Days
> of Pompeii, which opens with the
> famous line "It was a dark and stormy night." Hence the following
> contest.
> These are the 10 winners of this year's Bulwer-Lytton contest (run
> by the English Dept of San Jose State
> University), wherein one writes only the first line of a
> bad novel.
>
> 10) "As a scientist, Throckmorton knew that if he were
> ever to break
> wind in the echo chamber, he would
> never hear the end of it."
>
> 9) "Just beyond the Narrows the river widens."
>
> 8) "With a curvaceous figure that Venus would have
> envied, a tanned,
> unblemished oval face framed with
> lustrous thick brown hair, deep azure-blue eyes fringed with long
> black lashes, perfect teeth that vied for
> competition, and a small straight nose, Marilee had a beauty that
> defied description."
>
> 7) "Andre, a simple peasant, had only one thing on his mind as he
> crept along the East wall: 'Andre creep...
> Andre creep... Andre creep.'"
>
> 6) "Stanislaus Smedley, a man always on the cutting edge of
> narcissism, was about to give his body and
> soul to a back alley sex-change surgeon to become the woman he
> loved."
>
> 5) "Although Sarah had an abnormal fear of mice, it did
> not keep her
> from eeking out a living at a local pet
> store."
>
> 4) "Stanley looked quite bored and somewhat detached, but then,
> penguins often do."
>
> 3) "Like an over-ripe beefsteak tomato rimmed with cottage cheese,
> the corpulent remains of Santa Claus
> lay dead on the hotel floor."
>
> 2) "Mike Hardware was the kind of private eye who didn't know the
> meaning of the word 'fear'; a man who
> could laugh in the face of danger and spit in the eye of
> death -- in
> short, a moron with suicidal tendencies."
>
> AND THE WINNER IS...
>
> 1) "The sun oozed over the horizon, shoved aside darkness, crept
> along the greensward, and, with sickly
> fingers, pushed through the castle window, revealing the pillaged
> princess, hand at throat, crown asunder,
> gaping in frenzied horror at the sated, sodden amphibian lying
> beside her, disbelieving the magnitude of
> the frog's deception, screaming madly, 'You lied!'"
