Pangrams
I'll Take One of Everything
A pangram is a sentence that uses all the letters of the alphabet.
In the book Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn, a statue has been
erected to the person (given the name "Nevin Nollop") who invented
the phrase
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
But when a few of the brass letters fall off, the council rules that
this is a sign that those letters should no longer be used in
speech and writing. (This requires people to talk in lipograms
of increasing strength.) The only thing that will stop the council
is for the citizens try to come up with a shorter pangram than that
achieved by Nollop.
If you try this yourself, you soon find that your initial progress
is always stymied by a recalcitrant set of unworkable consonants.
It's tempting to invoke the help of Mr Mxyzptlk!
Some sentences, commonly used to practice typing skills, are
almost, but not quite, pangrams:
-
Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.
Quiz my black Whigs export fund.
Most pangrams use a few letters several times:
-
Few quips galvanized the mock jury box. (32)
-
How quickly daft jumping zebras vex. (30)
-
Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz. (31)
-
Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs. (32)
-
Quick wafting zephyrs vex bold Jim. (29)
-
Quick zephyrs blow, vexing daft Jim. (29)
-
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. (35)
-
Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud. (28)
-
Bawds jog, flick quartz, vex nymphs. (28)
The best pangrams use each letter exactly once, becoming,
in the process, close to gibberish:
-
Blowzy night-frumps vex'd Jack Q.
-
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz.
-
Fjord-buck zags whelm qvint pyx.
-
Frowzy things plumb vex'd Jack Q.
-
J Q Schwartz flung D V Pike my box.
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J Q Vandz struck my big fox whelp.
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Junky qoph-flags vext crwd zimb.
-
Milk-vat fez bugs qoph-crwd jynx.
-
Mr Jock, TV quiz PhD, bags few lynx.
-
New job: fix Mr Gluck's hazy TV.
-
Squdgy fez, blank jimp crwth vox.
(Due to Claude Shannon, the founder of modern information theory).
-
Vext cwm fly zing jabs Kurd qoph.
Last revised on 08 September 2009.