Oulipo writing prompts

Expand your creativity by constraining your choices

Shoreditch, by Terry Freedman

As I have written before, Oulipo is a writing movement that uses constraints in order to enhance creativity and generate new writing. Here are a few writing prompts based on, or in the spirit of, Oulipo techniques. In each case I’ve given an example of my own response to the prompt.

What I’ve found from doing this is that it makes you think very hard about what words to use, and how to use them. It has certainly flexed my writing muscles!

For more information on the Oulipo, see my review of The Penguin Book of Oulipo. And why not sign up to a short introductory course I’m running? It’s called Writing the Oulipo: A Taster, and is a very brief (two and a half hours) introduction to some useful and interesting writing techniques. Details here: Writing the Oulipo.

Prompt 1: Write an article as an acrostic

An acrostic is a piece of writing in which letters or words in particular positions form a word or a sentence. In the following article I’ve hidden the name of a short story writer I really didn’t like much. Can you discern the name of the author?

In the summer of 2019 I signed up for another round of short story courses at the City Lit. Science fiction stories are all very well, but there is a whole world “out there”. And frankly, I was starting to feel that I was missing out. Knowing there is so much more to read is a great incentive to retain as many marbles as I can, for as long as I can — but….

Did I ever mention that the word “short” seems to have a different meaning to different writers? In some cases, it means six words, while in others it can mean a hundred or more pages. Now, I love reading as much as the next person, but be reasonable! Each time I picked up one of the stories, I had to start again because it was so convoluted. So my misery was made even worse.

Eventually, I reached the end and breathed a huge sigh of relief. “Now for the next one on the list — thank goodness.”, I said to my wife as I replaced the book on its shelf.

Can you identify the writer?

Prompt 2: Write an article of exactly 49 words

Why 49? Why not? One magazine I write reviews for imposes a word limit of 150. The lower the limit, the harder it is to write a good review.

Climate Change for Dummies is a welcome change from the ranting we hear from people who glue themselves to motorways. It’s reasonably balanced and scientifically sound. However, in the authors’ enthusiasm to encourage us to “go green”, they forget to mention all relevant facts, and our desire for comfort.

Prompt 3: Write a review without using the letter ‘A’

The technique of omitting a letter is known as a lipogram.

This book is not only scientifically sound, it presents different points of view. It is, however, optimistic in its hope for our much needed lifestyle revolution.

Conclusion

I do not pretend that any of these pieces will set the literary world alight. They were, however, very useful for me as a writer to ‘force’ me to think carefully about each word and sentence.

Once again, here are the details of the course I’m running:

Writing the Oulipo