So first we had smoke fiction, which is a short story as long as it takes to smoke a cigarette, and then flash fiction, which can be a lot quicker, and then six-word stories, which is about as short as you can get. But now there’s Txt Lit – not measured in words, but in characters. There’s a monthly competition for the best story, with a limit of 160 characters, the maximum length of a text message. Although there’s been news about this type of thing going on in Japan, this competition is UK- based. There’s not been much noise about Txt Lit in the U.S., but after the commercial success in other countries, and the amount of time I see my students spend staring at their cell phones, I wonder if it’s only a matter of time. Here’s how the competition organizers define it:
Txt Lit is a new literary genre of creative writing using a mobile phone texting system, or SMS (Short Message System). We like to call stories written within these parameters Micro Stories.
Here’s an example of one of the stories, which, strangely enough, isn’t written using texting abbreviations, though I expected it to be (to maximize the 160 characters, of course):
Smash, grab. The hooded thief ran towards the busy high street where he would melt into the crowd. In his haste he didn’t look before crossing. Hit, run.
Sometimes I’m unsure whether the website that hosts the competition is using abbreviation as a mask to hide their inability to spell. For instance, on the website, check out the following words: “informaiton” “makng” “spechtre”. At first I thought I caught a misspelling, and then wondered if it was some kind of text-messaging abbreviation. But apparently it shouldn’t be, because in the official contest rules, they say:
We love the English language and believe that it is so rich and dynamic that micro stories need never be written in the abbreviated language associated with mobile phones. Therefore, stories which contain phrases such as “wud b gr8 2CU B4 satrdy” (Would be great to see you before Saturday) will stand little chance of winning, unless its use is integral to the story.
I actually think that this rule is a shame. The medium should dictate the spelling, and by limiting yourself to the form of text-messaging (160 characters), you should also limit yourself to the type of spelling (idiosyncratic abbreviations). I respect the English language as much as anyone, but when you start counting in spaces and commas and letters instead of words, and you’re requiring submission in a medium that thrives on shortening words, you’ve already established a platform that justifies abbreviations.
Lastly, charging one pound per entry is a bit of a sham, especially when the prize is only fifty pounds. Due to the ease of submission, it’s safe to say that the contest organizers stand to make quite a bit of money off of writers. It’s probably necessary to charge something, just to prevent the number of entries from approaching the onslaught of spam, but at least the prize money should be upped.
