The Alliteriliad, a lipogram
Ah, an affray about an aureate apple! (Articulate, amaranthine, Achilles' acrimony) Ares and Athena attend as Argives assault Anatolia. Arrogant Agamemnon avoids appeasing an ally; accordingly, Achilles abnegates arms, assassinated as an arrow—admirable archery, actually—aimed at an ankle annihilates adversary. Abject Andromache aches: alas, Astyanax, an atrocious action! Artless Ajax absent armor, Aeneas adorns Anchises, Antilochus administers abominable account, Achaeans accomplish an astonishing ambush ... and Aulis, after all, augured authentically.
Beware, beauteous Briseis: bagged by bellicose barbarians, beset by burdens (brutal, bemeaning both), breeds bad blood between belligerents. But...
Clairvoyant Cassandra, consistently correct, craves credit; cruel Clytemnestra causes calamity. Chalcas construes curses. (Chant, celestial, conqueror's choler!) Chryses collects comely Chryseis, conflict concludes catastrophically.
Dawn's dahlia-dyed digits delight doughty Diomedes; dastardly Deiphobos dares deprave divine daughter. Deities, duplicitous, discomfited, decry debacle.
Eris, ever egregious, expurgates equanimity, encourages enmity, evokes eulogies. Enemies end equally engulfed, each excoriating epithets.
Fie! Few forbear ferocity, furiously fight for feud's futility. Friends felicitously forgive, fetter fracas, fecklessly falter, fission forges full forfeit.
Glib gainsay Gods, get going. Glaucys generously gives Greek greaves, garners glamor.
How heroic! Hector (Hecuba's heir) heeds his honor, hushes haughty Helen's hatred (hardly hubris), hurts hundreds himself. Hence, however, he hurries harder, Hades happens. Ha! Huge horse hoodwinks hostiles, history! (Homer hits home, huh?)
Innocent Iphigenia is iniquitously immolated. In ilium, irate inimical invaders interdict impecunious inhabitants. Inimitable Iris incarnates irrevocable infinite incandescence indeed; Idomeneus is indefatigable.
Join justified judgment journey? Just jealousy,
Knives kill kith, kin, ken? Kneel, know Kyprian's kiss.
Lo! Laertes' lad likes lumber lots! Listen: largest leader, literally legendary, lacks limits, looks like loyal lives likely lost.
Maladroit Menelaus' machinations make many mincemeat (Melodize, Muse, Myrmidon's madness!), machinations massacre myriads. Mortal men, middling, malleable, maintain macabre misery.
Noble nestor, no neophyte, never nonplussed, narrates neverendingly.
Noxious, negligent newcomer Neoptolemus negates nobility: Not nice!
Orator Odysseus observed oath, oared over oenologically opaque oceans, opposed obdurate others, observed, opined ... O original orchestration! Ordeal over! (Owl-orbed, ox-orbed ones overjoyed)
Peerless pariah Paris, petulant pawn, pious patriarch Priam's progeny, possesses profuse perfidious peccadillos. Poor pulchritudinous Patroclus, poignantly perishing, propagated peril. Penthesilea's portion: personal pyre. Parenthesis: panegyric paeans palpably prevent precision.
Queen's quintessential quarrel quickens quiescent quagmire. Questions? Qualms? Quite Quixotic.
Really, rapacious rabble? Reconcile? Recant! Requite? Rant! Redeem? Remonstrate! Rancour, regicide.
Ships sail spirit-shadowed seas, sickly Scamander stigmatizes soldiers. Stolid son Sarpedon's survival subsumed. Stoics, sophists, stentorians, saturnine, sanctimonious, shallow, sanguine, soporific, splenetic, stingy, sullen, savage, subdued, supercilious, scurvy, suppliants, sober, sycophants -- society still smoulders, sinks, squanders, simpers, suffers. So sad.
Taciturn Telamonian titan tramples Trojans; Thersites' temerity, tampering, troubles truce. Thalassa! Thetis, turbulent Thetis, tormented, transgressed, tortured. Tsk.
Ulterior urges' ugliness undermines ubiquitous underclass. Ugh, unfeigned uncouthness.
Volatile, vicious victors vanquish various villages. Voluble verisimilitude vilifies veracity. Virago, valiant, valorous, volatile virago, vitiated in vain.
Winged words withheld while wine-washed waters waft warriors where wrath weighs wearily. Worship war, wrathful wags! Whimsical wooden work wins.
Xenophobia x'es Xenios.
Yikes, years yank youths yonder. You yell: yield yet? Yes.
Zounds! Zeitgeist: zillion, Zeus: zero. Zap!
David Taylor
David Taylor has worked as a journalist and as a biotechnologist, but every now and then the muse grabs him by the throat and he has no choice but to write something creative. He once aspired to be an opera singer, but gave that up to pursue his dream of being a lawyer; then he gave up that dream, too, to pursue his dream of becoming happy. He has read Lolita 11 times, each Jim Thompson novel once, and War and Peace for the bragging rights. He lives in Montreal, Quebec.