Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: Monosyllabic short stories

His mad lust these days is for nought but a trip to Hell… Credit: PRISMA ARCHIVO / Alamy Stock Photo 
issue 26 February 2022

In Competition No. 3237, you were invited to submit a short story using words of only one syllable.

This challenge produced a delightfully diverse entry with echoes of Dr Seuss, Hemingway, Kafka, Shakespeare and Beckett. The winning slots were keenly contested and I regretted not having space for Frank McDonald’s meditation on St Paul and the nature of love or David Shields on Kant and sense perception.

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