It Was a Dark and Stormy Night . . .

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (BLFC) is a tongue-in-cheek contest that takes place annually and is sponsored by the English Department of San José State University in San Jose, California. Entrants are invited "to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels" — that is, deliberately bad. A prize of US$250 is awarded.
The contest was initiated in 1982 by Professor Scott Rice and is named "in honour" of English novelist and playwright Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, author of the much-quoted first line "It was a dark and stormy night." This opening continues floridly:

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.—Paul Clifford, available freely at Project Gutenberg





The first year of the competition attracted just three entries from on-campus, but it expanded to gain international attention and may attract as many as 10,000 entries in a year. There are also now several subcategories, such as detective fiction, romance novels, Western novels, and purple prose. Sentences that are notable but are judged not quite bad enough to merit the Grand Prize or a category prize are awarded Dishonorable Mentions.


One of my favorites is this entry by the 1983 winner:

"The camel died quite suddenly on the second day, and Selena fretted sulkily and, buffing her already impeccable nails--not for the first time since the journey began--pondered snidely if this would dissolve into a vignette of minor inconveniences like all the other holidays spent with Basil." --Gail Cain, San Francisco, California (1983 Winner)