{"id":4367,"date":"2012-11-03T00:45:00","date_gmt":"2012-11-03T00:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/?p=4367"},"modified":"2026-01-15T18:12:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-15T18:12:21","slug":"nablopomo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/?p=4367","title":{"rendered":"NaBloPoMo"},"content":{"rendered":"

In honour of NaBloPoMo – National Novel Writing Month –  I found a site<\/a> that has collected some of the “better” worse opening lines of a novel, after “It was a dark and stormy night….”<\/p>\n

Since 1982 the English department at San Jose State University has sponsored
\nthe Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, a whimsical literary competition that
\nchallenges entrants to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible
\nnovels. Here are this year’s winners.<\/p>\n

10) “As a scientist, Throckmorton knew that if he were ever to break wind in
\nthe echo chamber he would never hear the end of it.”
\n9) “Just beyond the Narrows the river widens.”
\n8) “With a curvaceous figure that Venus would have envied, a tanned,
\nunblemished oval face framed with lustrous thick brown hair, deep azure-blue
\neyes fringed with long black lashes, perfect teeth that vied for competition,
\nand a small straight nose, Marilee had a beauty that defied description.”
\n7) “Andre, a simple peasant, had only one thing on his mind as he crept along
\nthe east wall: “Andre creep … Andre creep … Andre creep.”
\n6) “Stanislaus Smedley, a man always on the cutting edge of narcissism, was
\nabout to give his body and soul to a back alley sex change surgeon to become the
\nwoman he loved.”
\n5) “Although Sarah had an abnormal fear of mice, it did not keep her from
\neking out a living at a local pet store.”
\n4) “Stanley looked quite bored and somewhat detached, but then penguins often
\ndo.”
\n3) “Like an overripe beefsteak tomato rimmed with cottage cheese, the
\ncorpulent remains of Santa Claus lay dead on the hotel floor.”
\n2) “Mike Hardware was the kind of private eye who didn’t know the meaning of
\nthe word “fear,” a man who could laugh in the face of danger and spit in the eye
\nof death — in short, a moron with suicidal tendencies.”<\/p>\n

AND THE WINNER IS …<\/p>\n

1) “The sun oozed over the horizon, shoved aside darkness, crept along the
\ngreen sward, and, with sickly fingers, pushed through the castle window,
\nrevealing the pillaged princess, hand at throat, crown asunder, gaping in
\nfrenzied horror at the sated, sodden amphibian lying beside her, disbelieving
\nthe magnitude of the frog’s deception, screaming madly, “You lied!”<\/p>\n

and some of the best!!<\/p>\n

\u201cHappy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.\u201d
\n\u2014 Anna Karenina \u2013 Leo Tolstoy<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.\u201d \u2014
\n1984 \u2013 George Orwell<\/p>\n

\n“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a
\ngood fortune, must be in want of a wife.\u201d \u2014 Pride and Prejudice \u2013 Jane
\nAustin<\/p>\n

“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.\u201d \u2014
\nVoyage of the Dawn Treader \u2013 C. S. Lewis<\/p>\n

\u201cI, Tiberius Claudius Drusus Nero Germanicus This-that-and-the-other (for I
\nshall not trouble you yet with all my titles) who was once, and not so long ago
\neither, known to my friends and relatives and associates as \u201cClaudius the
\nIdiot,\u201d or \u201cThat Claudius,\u201d or \u201cClaudius the Stammerer,\u201d or \u201cClau-Clau-Claudius\u201d
\nor at best as \u201cPoor Uncle Claudius,\u201d am now about to write this strange history
\nof my life; starting from my earliest childhood and continuing year by year
\nuntil I reach the fateful point of change where, some eight years ago, at the
\nage of fifty-one, I suddenly found myself caught in what I may call the \u201cgolden
\npredicament\u201d from which I have never since become disentangled.\u201d \u2014 I, Claudius \u2013
\nRobert Graves<\/p>\n

You can find more here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And from the ones I have read and loved –<\/p>\n

“A few miles south of Solidad the Salinas river drops in close to the hillside
\nbank and runs deep and green.”
\nOf Mice and Men – John Steinbeck <\/p>\n

“He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream<\/span> and he had gone eighty-four
\ndays now without taking a fish.” The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway<\/p>\n

“I can see by my watch, without taking my hand from the left grip of the cycle, that it is eight-thirty in the morning.”  Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance – Robert M. Persig<\/p>\n

“1802 – I have just returned from a visit to my landlord – the solitary neighbour that I shall be troubled with.” Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte <\/p>\n

\n<\/span><\/b><\/span><\/h4>\n

\n<\/span><\/b><\/span><\/h4>\n

\n<\/span><\/span><\/b><\/span><\/h4>\n

<\/span>
\n“It was love at first sight. The first time Yossarian saw the chaplain he fell
\nmadly in love with him.”
\nCatch-22 – Joseph Heller.<\/p>\n

I thought that I would just give a little impetus to anyone out there who maybe contemplating the challenge.<\/p>\n

\n<\/a><\/div>\n

\nAnd it case you need a picture. Please post your own favourite first lines.  Here’s a site <\/a>that lists many.<\/p>\n

\nHave an inspiring day!!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In honour of NaBloPoMo – National Novel Writing Month –  I found a site that has collected some of the “better” worse opening lines of a novel, after “It was a dark and stormy night….” Since 1982 the English department at San Jose State University has sponsored the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, a whimsical literary competition […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4368,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4367"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4367\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4369,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4367\/revisions\/4369"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeiswhathappens.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}