Bulwer-Lytton and the art of bad writing

[Harry]

This year The Bulwer-Lytton prize for mangled metaphors was awarded to this doozy ...

"Cheryl's mind turned like the vanes of a wind-powered turbine, chopping her sparrow-like thoughts into bloody pieces that fell onto a growing pile of forgotten memories",

[Winifred]

My heart jumped with the grace of a silver frog over a rainbow-colored lily pond at the very thought of a game of mangled metaphors!

[Harry]

Could take the place of trivial pursuit, couldn't it?

[Winifred]

Maybe a kind moderator could move the thread to the "Forum Games" column and make it official. Could be as much fun as a greased barrel of pickles!

[Star_Anise]

Maybe a kind moderator could move the thread to the "Forum Games" column and make it official. Could be as much fun as a greased barrel of pickles!

Done - although if a name change is required I'll take suggestions. But I'll leave the pickles alone for now.

[Winifred]

Hmm, that does present a question - upon refreshing my memory with that memory extender, Google, Bulwer-Lytton is actually for awful first sentences of novels. Do we go with that, or go with a mangled metaphors game? I think it is Harry's call!

[Harry]

Frankly I think it would be difficult for anyone on this site to write an inept first sentence ... Mangled metaphors would be far more challenging. (Much too difficult for me)

Here's an example from a twelve=year old ... “The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.”

[Star_Anise]

Hmm, that does present a question - upon refreshing my memory with that memory extender, Google, Bulwer-Lytton is actually for awful first sentences of novels. Do we go with that, or go with a mangled metaphors game? I think it is Harry's call!


Frankly I think it would be difficult for anyone on this site to write an inept first sentence ... Mangled metaphors would be far more challenging. (Much too difficult for me)

Here's an example from a twelve=year old ... “The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.”

Well I've made a slight change to the title that hopefully opens up the meaning of the thread a little:)

[Winifred]

We have hairdryer weather in August Florida: open the door cautiously, and flame- haired volcanoes breathe fiery, yet soggy, morning breath. Even the short-haired cats want to swim in their water bowls.

[Harry]

Last night my goldfish committed suicide, I should have been more understanding.

[margaine]

I'm not entirely sure if we are supposed to make our own bad sentences, or cite those of other people. Also, I'm not sure if we are supposed to use badly written first sentences as examples, or only mangled metaphors?

In any case

I tried to start Jean M. Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear the other day, and I couldn't get past the first sentence:

"The naked child ran out of the hide-covered lean-to toward the rocky beach at the bend in the small river"

No mixed metaphors, but an unbearable string of prepositional phrases and simple adjectives. Maybe the rest of the book is better, but I really disliked this sentence.

[Winifred]

As the front of the pristine white Honda crumbled with a distinctly crisp smack, the blue cheese dressing effect was heightened by the rent veins of gray and blue as the groaning metal crumpled. She never before knew that car bumpers were lined with styrofoam.

[Harry]

"It was a wrong number that started it, the telephone ringing three times in the dead of night, and the voice on the other end asking for someone he was not." - Paul Auster, City of Glass (1985)

[Winifred]

The day was going swimmingly, she thought, until she suggested the walk on the beach to watch the moonrise. The moon didn't rise, the stars were smudged with a light coat of haze, and the family bickered and scattered like pepper floating in a glass of water when you add soap.


inspiration: http://drholly.typepad.com/ask_me_a_chemistry_questi/2006/01/pepper_and_soap.html