Six word stories

I wonder if the people behind the Electric Literature Single Sentence Animation series know about Hemingway's wager, made over lunch at the famous haunt of Jazz Age literary life, the Algonquin Hotel in Manhattan, that he could write an entire short story using just six words, and how he won it with "For sale: baby shoes, never worn".

Naturally many people since then have wanted to try their hands at this exploit, and to see their varying success you can go to sites like Six Word Stories. Most of the attempts resemble death bed utterances rather than stories, such as this from the annoying Dave Eggers (Category: Celebrity): "Found true love. Married someone else." Compare it to this jewel from the unknown Dan Rako: “Home early. Whose car is that?” (Category: Surprize).

The Guardian commissioned and published a collection of noted authors' six word stories a few years ago where the pickings are much better. My favourites are

"Apple?" "No." "Taste!" "ADAM?" Oh God.
--  David Lodge

Juicy offer. Must decline. Still paralysed.
--  Richard Ford

If only they could be seven words, I'd have one ready made. It's this phrase spoken a few days ago by the woman who was driving my daughter's class to school camp, in response to a question from one of the kids: "This isn't a bus, it's a coach".

Anyone out there want to try their hand?

The world's fastest Hemingway

Anthony Hopkins is going to play Ernest Hemingway in a movie to be produced, written, directed and co-starred in (in the role of a Cuban fishing boat captain) by Andy Garcia. The news is out and also the puns. The best one is the title of The Risky Biz blog post which I believe is also the one which broke the news last week: “The Bell Tolls for Andy Garcia”. The Guardian’s “For Whom the Camera Rolls” is far behind, perhaps not even in the running.

Read the Risky Biz post. Read as far as the comments. As often happens, they are the funniest part, involving an actor -- actually an “author-performer”-- of that kind who uses three names, failing at self-promotion. I laughed out loud. Then I was trying to think of performers who were great enough to deserve three names but I couldn't think of any. I mean, I thought of George Bernard Shaw but I believe he was only a performer offstage. I tried asking my daughter if she could. She thought for a moment and offered “Robert Downey Junior?”