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The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (BLFC) was a tongue-in-cheek contest, held annually and sponsored by the English Department of
San José State University in
San Jose, California
San Jose, officially the City of San José ( ; ), is a cultural, commercial, and political center within Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area. With a city population of 997,368 and a metropolitan area population of 1.95 million, it is ...
until 2025. Entrants were invited "to compose the
opening sentence
The opening sentence or opening line stands at the beginning of a written work. The opening line is part or all of the opening sentence that may start the lead paragraph. For older texts the Latin term ('it begins') is in use for the very first w ...
to the worst of all possible novels" – that is, one which was deliberately bad.
According to the official rules, the prize for winning the contest was "a pittance". The 2008 winner received $250, while the 2014 winners' page said the grand prize winner received "about $150". In 2023, the prize was "a cheap certificate and bragging rights".
The contest was started in 1982 by Professor Scott E. Rice of the English Department at
San Jose State University
San José State University (San Jose State or SJSU) is a Public university, public research university in San Jose, California. Established in 1857, SJSU is the List of oldest schools in California, oldest public university on the West Coast of ...
and was named for English novelist and playwright
Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, author of the much-quoted first line "
It was a dark and stormy night". This opening, from the
1830
It is known in European history as a rather tumultuous year with the Revolutions of 1830 in France, Belgium, Poland, Switzerland and Italy.
Events January–March
* January 11 – LaGrange College (later the University of North Alabama) ...
novel ''
Paul Clifford'', reads in full:
The first year of the competition attracted just three entries, but it went public the next year, received media attention, and attracted 10,000 entries. The contest eventually expanded into several subcategories, such as
detective fiction
Detective fiction is a subgenre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an criminal investigation, investigator or a detective—whether professional, amateur or retired—investigates a crime, often murder. The detective genre began around ...
,
romance novel
A romance or romantic novel is a genre fiction novel that primarily focuses on the relationship and Romance (love), romantic love between two people, typically with an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending. Authors who have contributed ...
s,
Western novels, and
purple prose
In literary criticism, purple prose is overly ornate prose text that may disrupt a narrative flow by drawing undesirable attention to its own extravagant style of writing, thereby diminishing the appreciation of the prose overall. Purple prose i ...
. Sentences that were notable but not quite bad enough to merit the Grand Prize or a category prize were awarded Dishonorable Mentions.
Winning entrants
The winning entries are available at the contest website.
Collections
Six books collecting the best BLFC entries have been published:
* ''It Was a Dark and Stormy Night'' (1984),
* ''Son of "It Was a Dark and Stormy Night"'' (1986),
* ''Bride of Dark and Stormy'' (1988),
* ''It Was a Dark & Stormy Night: The Final Conflict'' (1992),
* ''Dark and Stormy Rides Again'' (1996),
* ''It Was a Dark and Stormy Night'' (2007),
An audio cassette of the winning entries in the BLFC was also released:
* ''It Was a Dark and Stormy Night'' (1997), audio cassette, .
See also
*
Lyttle Lytton Contest
Adam Cadre (born February 5, 1974, in Silver Spring, Maryland) is an American writer active in a number of forms—novels, screenplays, webcomics, essays—but best known for his work in interactive fiction.
Biography
Cadre's 1998 piece '' Photo ...
, a derivative favoring extremely short first sentences
*
The Dweller of the Threshold, a contemporaneous parody of Bulwer-Lytton by
Bret Harte
*
Purple prose
In literary criticism, purple prose is overly ornate prose text that may disrupt a narrative flow by drawing undesirable attention to its own extravagant style of writing, thereby diminishing the appreciation of the prose overall. Purple prose i ...
*
Bad Sex in Fiction Award run by ''
Literary Review'' magazine
*
Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year
*
International Imitation Hemingway Competition
Notes
References
External links
Bulwer Lytton Fiction Contest web site"From Worst to First: Literary Award Marks the Pits of Prose"Chronicle of Higher Education News blog (2007)
{{Edward Bulwer-Lytton
Culture of San Jose, California
San Jose State University
Humorous literary awards
Writing contests
Recurring events established in 1982
Edward Bulwer-Lytton