M. J. Nicholls

G. N. Forester

A monument to our insatiable verbivoracity, The Syllabus is an act of humble genuflection before the authors responsible for those texts which have transported us to the peak of readerly nirvana and back. The texts featured, chosen in a rapturous frenzy by editors and contributors alike, represent a broad sweep of the most important exploratory fiction written in the last hundred years (and beyond). Featuring 100 texts from (fewer than) 100 contributors, The Syllabus is a form of religious creed, and should be read primarily as a holy manual from which the reader draws inspiration and hope, helping to shape their intellectual and moral life with greater awareness, and lead them towards those works that offer deep spiritual succour while surviving on a merciless and unkind planet. Readers of this festschrift should expect nothing less than an incontrovertible conversion from reader to insatiable verbivore in 225 pages. "The Syllabus, as a third volume of Verbivoracious Festschrift, is a celebration of reading. It's a great literary feast for the true readers, for all the verbivores around the world, a feast consisting of hundred delicious meals. I am honored to be a part of that unforgettable menu." - Dubravka Ugre i ."

The Syllabus

Verbivoracious Festschrift Volume Three

The sixth Verbivoracious Festschrift is a brobdingnagian spectacular fEting the famous workshop of potential literature, The Oulipo, now entering its 57th year. Our contributors were invited to write a piece of fiction, an essay, a poem, or any other hybrid, and choose their own constraints. The results have yielded a marvellous sprawl of oulipian homage, from petite poetic tributes to Queneau, to long lipogrammatic bows to Perec. In this issue: Philip Terry's take on Perec's I Remember, Warren Motte's literary abecedaries, David Bellos's iconoclastic essay on Hugo and Perec, two chapters from Jeff Bursey's lipogrammic novel Ennead, Louis Bury's anticipatory blurbs, Michael Leong's take on the Oulipo's ever-expanding influence, Tom Jenks and Jeanelle D'Alessandro's satirical N]7s, Andriana Minou's typographically playful novella Hypnotic Labyrinth, John Peck's murder mystery in 100 sentences, poetry from Doug Nufer and Stephen Frug, Marc Lapprand's view on evolution and The Oulipo, a slew of palindromes, lists, papers, and fancies from Pablo Ruiz, and many other pieces. The issue concludes with a wholly original work of sustained constraint: Christine Brooke-Rose's first novel rewritten with her grammatical constraints and polylingual puns reinstated. The sixth issue is our fattest feast yet, and a must for Oulipo enthusiasts.

The Oulipo

Verbivoracious Festschrift Volume Six

A brilliant and overlooked amalgam of highbrow genius and contemporary pop culture, Gilbert Adair is a pasticheur par excellence and the subject of the Verbivoracious Festschrift Volume Two. Contains a savoury range of pastiches, essays, and Adair's previously unpublished verse poem parody, The Rape of the Cock.

G. N. Forester

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