'It Was a Dark & Stormy Night' Bad Writing Contest- Try Writing One!

[Archaic]

The 1-Sentence Rule

"the roaring fires and welcoming bosoms of home"

Thanks for the submissions everyone; they're all pretty funny.

But if you want to write within the rules of the Bulwer-Lytton (Bad) Fiction Contest, please remember that your work must be only one sentence long.

That's what makes it so difficult... you have to be both atrocious and pithy!

So far Robert's last offering is getting my vote... it reminds me of that wonderful Shakespeare quote: "Brevity is the soul of wit."

Thanks and keep 'em coming!
Archaic

PS: Entries can be on any subject you want; they don't have to be Ripper-related. (Though for understandable reasons Ripper-related entries might prove to be crowd favorites.)

[Tom_Wescott]

"The sun had its hat on." I think that line is pretty awesome, actually.

And wow, you're right, Robert's paragraph was actually a full sentence. I think he ripped it from a Begg book!

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Robert]

Inside the Ringers, the women were gossiping as usual : "I suppose you've heard, there's been another one, and young PC Jones fainted when he saw it, though it's his wife I feel sorry for, I mean, giving birth to sextuplets is no joke...."

[Robert]

It was a cold September morning when Sherlock Holmes entered my room, announced that the Whitechapel Fiend had just left his first clue, and triumphantly placed a nicotine-stained forefinger against the following advertisement from the personal column of 'The Times' : "Man with knife would like to meet woman with womb."

[Archaic]

It was a cold September morning when Sherlock Holmes entered my room, announced that the Whitechapel Fiend had just left his first clue, and triumphantly placed a nicotine-stained forefinger against the following advertisement from the personal column of 'The Times' : "Man with knife would like to meet woman with womb."

Ok, here's one:

Arriving back at her dismally pungent lodgings with the cracked window pane, crude deal table, and challenging three-legged chair,
Mary sighed for the good old days back at the Welsh coal mines.

Please tell me I'm getting worse.

Thanks,
Archaic

[Archaic]

The night was dark, very dark; too dark to see unless you had the amazing skill to see in the dark, which no one has,
so I couldn’t see enough to even begin to describe to you everything that I was not seeing.

Bad?
Archaic

[Archaic]

It was another grueling day in the workhouse.


Now come on, guys; that's bad!


Archaic

[Magpie]

Try our hand at bad writing? I'm way ahead of the rest of you folks. Click the 'Dissertations' section and you'll find a few entries from me.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

You never know Tom--if you start now, you might finish in time to enter the 2024 competition....

[Archaic]

Outside it was grim.

The weather was grim, the room inside was grim, the wind and rain in the courtyard were grimishly grim.

She felt pretty grim thinking about all this grimnish.

She laid down on the grim bed in the small grimly furnished room and passed out.

He put his arm through the window, silently, with a grim determination.

"Mummy! I love you" he said to himself gaily, a grim look on his face.

He raised the knife to her prostate body.

It was all pretty much grim.

Hi Ruby.
I like this; can you condense it into one sentence of 50-60 words? I was thinking you could throw in words like grimly, grimace, grimey... I wonder how many variations there are?

The sun had it's hat on.

Hi Phil. That is a good line.

Best regards,
Archaic

[mariab]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil Carter
The sun had it's hat on.
Sounds like French surrealist poetry, Le bateau ivre {The drunk boat} or something.

[Robert]

Rhythmically breathed the great city of London, in and out, in and out, and with each putrid breath the waves broke and tossed their human jetsam upon the shores of Shoreditch, and of Spitalfields, and of Whitechapel, while the dread blind beachcomber picked his crooked way along the strand.

PS I claim a bonus point for "shores of Shoreditch."

[Archaic]

Rhythmically breathed the great city of London, in and out, in and out, and with each putrid breath the waves broke and tossed their human jetsam upon the shores of Shoreditch, and of Spitalfields, and of Whitechapel, while the dread blind beachcomber picked his crooked way along the strand.

PS I claim a bonus point for "shores of Shoreditch."

You're a poet, Robert.

OK, you can have an extra point for how terrible "shores of Shoreditch" sounds, but does that mean I get a bonus point for "Another grueling day in the workhouse"?

It's got 'Vile Pun Champion' smeared all over it.


Archaic

[Robert]

Yes Bunny, the gruelling pun earns a bonus.

[Archaic]

Hi Robert.

I just discovered that "grueling" is spelled with two " l's " in the UK. Here it's just one.

I helped a British friend do some editing, and hit a few other examples...I think "traveler" was one. You guys write "traveller". (Just writing that lit up my Spellcheck. )

Cheers,
B.

[Robert]

Yes Bunny, there are a few differences in spelling. But the kind of thing that really puzzles me about Americans is, how come no US cop can solve a case unless he has a polystyrene cup of coffee in his hand?