Below you'll find a batch of short narratives leading to even shorter conclusions consisting of abecedarially constrained vocables. These texts have been inspired by a set of George Perec’s annual “Wishes” – the famous Oulipian’s passages of imaginative prose sent to his friends each new year. Bonne annee!
BAybEebIbOhboU
During the now-infamous 1919 season of American baseball (infamous, admittedly, for reasons unrelated to the event here under discussion), a novice sports reporter for the Hearst-owned Boston newspaper The American found himself tasked with an unusual assignment: interviewing Red Sox players in pursuit of a story behind the rumor then making its way around the league – namely that there existed a demonstrable link, a direct numerical proportion, between the volume of beer, wine or other spirits of choice consumed by any given hitter prior to a game and that player’s batting average. Questioned on the subject, specifically regarding Sultan of Swat George Ruth, who was enjoying yet another stellar year at the time, the team’s third-base coach not only effectively quashed this theory but gave it a brief dose of the raspberries to boot, at least as far as that theory might pertain to the Bambino, answering…
“Babe…? He bibe eau. Boo!”
CAycEecIcOhcoU
"Hey, Mor! What's in the recipe for that delicious chicken loaf thingamie you always make for Maundy Thursday's dinner," asked NPR's Marketplace host of his Norwegian-born mother.
"That dish no good minout use special rooster bring in from China," cautioned the flour-dusted woman.
"I'd sure love to prepare it myself this year, even though our economically challenged President's tariffs on imported fowl -- hens and roosters -- make dishes like yours virtually impossible. I guess it'll take a real stroke of luck to get my hands on such a bird."
"Right, my boy," answered the senior Mrs. Ryssdal, who, expanding on her response, reminded her son...
“Cake key, Kai...? Coq coup.”
DAydEedIdOhdoU
Declan Donovan Dade, undistinguished husband and father but notorious in his neighborhood for being ever behind in the settlement of his pub tabs, passed away quietly in his sleep Sunday last. Several balladeers performing at Grogan's Castle Lounge, Dade's watering hole of choice, were swift to incorporate the miserly reputation of the pinchpenny Dade into their nightly ditties lionizing Lounge locals:
"O Dade, he died, dough due.
Dud dude Dade, he died, dough due.
He slipp'd off the plate owing 7s.8.* O...
Dade…? He died, dough due.”
* Seven shillings and eight pence, pronounced here "seven 'n' eight."
Dud dude Dade, he died, dough due.
He slipp'd off the plate owing 7s.8.* O...
Dade…? He died, dough due.”
* Seven shillings and eight pence, pronounced here "seven 'n' eight."
FAyfEefIfOhfoU
After decades as Hollywood's earliest Queen of Scream, Fay Wray tired of headlining horror films and began a search for "more demanding roles." Still, scripts casting her opposite a host of cinemonsters continued to pour in, all of which she roundly rejected. Then suddenly she reached an agreement with RKO to star in a proposed remake of King Kong -- an agreement which carried a significant codicil. In exchange for reprising her Anne Darrow character, she would be permitted additionally to star in a series of films portraying famous characters feigning madness. Such films would provide roles setting up the strong performances she now insisted on doing. As payment for her willingness to remake Kong (and, in passing, to save RKO from bankruptcy), the studio commissioned five screenplays providing the starring and costarring roles Ms. Wray demanded. Thus screenplays featuring fresh treatments of Hamlet, Randle McMurphy, Odysseus, Vincent Gigante and Nellie Bly (with Nellie, Wray was sure she smelt Oscar) were begun. As a Variety headline put it at the time…
"Fay fee...? Five faux fou."
GAygEegIgOhgUe
Introducing:
The Dance
Suite Quartet.
One guy glides
through a slow allemande.
The courante? Au courant
to a second.
(Seen together, they're
half
of the band.)
The third guy --
a
gal, as it happens --
shows a knack
for a slack sarabande.
The fourth, who a
gay gigue
engages,
is a newborn. Still,
give him a hand!
Or…
Gay gigue guy…? Go
"Goo!"
