Q. What did Bulwer-Lytton do to merit the honor of a contest in his name?
A. He has been an inspiration to generations of untalented writers, the most famous of whom is Snoopy in the Peanuts comic strip. It was Bulwer-Lytton in his novel Paul Clifford (1830) who introduced the notorious opening line "It was a dark and stormy night." This is, of course, the line with which Snoopy always opens his novels. (A much better writer, Madeleine L'Engle, also used it to open A Wrinkle in Time.) Having created a standard for bad openings with his line, Bulwer-Lytton alone deserves to have such a contest named after him.
Q. What's so bad about "It was a dark and stormy night"?
A. Aside from being a little obvious and melodramatic, not too much, if Bulwer-Lytton had stopped there. Unfortunately, he went on:
It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents -- except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.Even by Victorian standards the sentence will not win any prizes for economy or subtlety.
Q: Is the rest of the novel written in the same manner?
A: Sometimes it is even worse. In the very next sentence a character is "wending his solitary way." Later in the novel a fellow lighting his pipe is described as "applying the Promethean spark to his tube," a glass of beer is, "a nectarian beverage," and a bedroom is "a somnambular accomodation."
If you think your writing is up to these standards of badness and you would like to enter the Bulwer-Lytton contest, send your entries by April 15 to:
Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest
Department of English
San Jose State University
San Jose, CA 95192-0090
The Bulwer-Lytton contest is not affiliated in any way with our It Was a Dark and Stormy Mossy Bits contest, other than that we stole their idea.