When Really Bad Is Really Good by Susan Thurman
You've been working so hard on your drafting, revising, and proofreading that you're probably just about due for a good laugh. Here are some examples of really bad writing culled from the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which challenges writers to compose the worst possible opening sentence. The contest, which began in 1982, was named for Victorian novelist Edward George Earle Bulwer-Lytton (that's Baron Lytton of Knebworth to you), who began his novel Paul Clifford with one of the most famous (infamous?) lines in English literature: “It was a dark and stormy night.”
In your revision, remember George Orwell's five important rules of writing from his “Politics and the English Language”:
Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
Never use a long word where a short one will do.
If it's possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
Never use the passive where you can use the active.
Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
If you'd like to read more about the contest, see the “Lyttony” of winners at www.bulwer-lytton.com/lyttony.htm.
Recent winning entries have included the following:
Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you've had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean.
— Jim Guigli, Carmichael, California (2006 winner)
As he stared at her ample bosom, he daydreamed of the dual Stromberg carburetors in his vintage Triumph Spitfire, highly functional yet pleasingly formed, perched prominently on top of the intake manifold, aching for experienced hands, the small knurled caps of the oil dampeners begging to be inspected and adjusted as described in chapter seven of the shop manual.
— Dan McKay, Fargo, North Dakota (2005 winner)
She resolved to end the love affair with Ramon tonight … summarily, like Martha Stewart ripping the sand vein out of a shrimp's tail … though the term “love affair” now struck her as a ridiculous euphemism … not unlike “sand vein,” which is after all an intestine, not a vein … and that tarry substance inside certainly isn't sand … and that brought her back to Ramon.
— Dave Zobel, Manhattan Beach, California (2004 winner)
They had but one last remaining night together, so they embraced each other as tightly as that two-flavor entwined string cheese that is orange and yellowish-white, the orange probably being a bland Cheddar and the white … Mozzarella, although it could possibly be Provolone or just plain American, as it really doesn't taste distinctly dissimilar from the orange, yet they would have you believe it does by coloring it differently.
— Mariann Simms, Wetumpka, Alabama (2003 winner)
On reflection, Angela perceived that her relationship with Tom had always been rocky, not quite a roller-coaster ride but more like when the toilet-paper roll gets a little squashed so it hangs crooked and every time you pull some off you can hear the rest going bumpity-bumpity in its holder until you go nuts and push it back into shape, a degree of annoyance that Angela had now almost attained.
— Rephah Berg, Oakland California (2002 winner)
The Lytton ancestral residence, Knebworth House in Herfortshire, England, has been in the family since 1490. Today visitors come to Knebworth for tours of the home and for open-air concerts held on the grounds. The estate was chosen to be Wayne Manor for some of the Batman movies and has also been featured in The Shooting Party, Wilde, Jane Eyre, The Canterville Ghost, and Haunted Honeymoon.
