Oulipost #2: Lipogram (Newspaper Titles)
A lipogram is a text that excludes one or more letters of the alphabet. The ingenuity demanded by the restriction varies in proportion to the frequency of the letter or letters excluded. For this initial exercise, you will compose a poem using only words that can be formed from letters that are NOT found in the title of your newspaper. For example, if you are working with the Washington Post, you must avoid using words that contain the letters A, G, H, I, N, O, P, S, T and W. 
Why oh why, did I choose The Ottawa Citizen? I have only one vowel, the u, available, and perhaps y. Fortunately, one of the participants is a whiz at building word compiler tools, but not sure this prompt is workable with so few vowels. Need Christian Bök just now… However, I gave myself the luxury of titling without constraint
Senator Goes to Market
FUNDS!!!
Buy funds
Run up, up, up, up–
Surplus.
Surplus jump:
Run—
Up up up.
Fully fund
Duffy.
Carol A. Stephen
Sources:
SOURCES: Ottawa Citizen Digital April 2, 2014
- Press, Jordan, Harper-appointed senator argues against his plan for elected chamber
- Berthiaume, Lee & Press, Jordan, Investigation report clears Sen. Colin Kenny of harassment
- Shecter, Barbara Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan posts first surplus in 10 years
- Quebec’s forgotten region, By Ottawa Citizen Editorial, Ottawa Citizen
· Reevely, David Provincial Tories blow lid off Liberals’ budget plans
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Quillfyre 
I’d say you nailed it!
LOL Thanks, Linda!
Agreed. You worked wonders with that U!
Thanks, Reiser. It was certainly a challenge, as was your O!
Oh well done Carol…another zinger for the Duffster, and no less than he deserves! Yes, having only one vowel is a challenge (I had an “i” but used “y” also) but there’s someone on here (I forget who) who has NO vowels…egad.
I think I did use a y as well, although they were few and far between, as not too many u words to begin with. One of the word generators I found came up with only 207 words containing only u. I doubt it was a definitive list. One thing about this project, I am finding a lot of new toys to play with later, word generators and manipulators. They can be fun to run text through, then do sound or sight poems or just keep feeding through and then adding in your own words. Never enough time to play.
I think I saw a couple of people had no vowels. How clever they were to feed numbers in. Did you see the one where a mathematical problem was constructed? It ended in 9-11. I never thought of mixing in some numbers, what fun that was!
Sounds like one of those early reader books for kids that is really confusing for them but really hilarious to the adults involved :)
Yeah it does. On the other hand, could also be a book kids these days might get a laugh out of but parents say “what the heck?”
I used a y also, by accident, but then i didn’t want to go back and rework it. It’s a monumental effort to get any kind of narrative from some of these comstraints – kudos!
It is also by way of political commentary, so it worked (I thought!) on a couple of levels.