Thursday, October 26, 2006

Short, Sweet & to the Point


Dan Rubin of Bling pens a prosaic post about the shortest tale ever told. In Writes Fast With A Dog Underneath, Rubin explains:

Tell your tale in six words? Wired enlisted 38 writers and designers. They were inspired by Hemingway's briefest.


As Wired said in Very Short Stories:

We'll be brief: Hemingway once wrote a story in just six words ("For sale: baby shoes, never worn.") and is said to have called it his best work. So we asked sci-fi, fantasy, and horror writers from the realms of books, TV, movies, and games to take a shot themselves.

A few of my favorites:
Longed for him. Got him. Shit.
- Margaret Atwood

Wasted day. Wasted life. Dessert, please.
- Steven Meretzky

Heaven falls. Details at eleven.
- Robert Jordan

Bush told the truth. Hell froze.
- William Gibson

Thought I was right. I wasn't.
- Graeme Gibson

Lost, then found. Too bad.
- Graeme Gibson

Will this do (lazy writer asked)?
- Ken MacLeod

Steve ignores editor's word limit and
- Steven Meretzky


And my own contribution:

A few zig-zags, a different life.

~~~
This one's for Lee.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wasn't trying for prosaic. Was trying for six words in each sentence. I should have stuck with the usual poetry.

PA progressive said...

Declared war. Lost. I'm sorry, George.

Of course, you'll never see it written.