Pangrams
I'll Take One of Everything
A pangram is a sentence that uses all the letters of the alphabet.
People learning to type (or, these days, to "keyboard") are given
pangrams in order to practice locating every letter.
Font designers may choose a pangram as a way to attractively
display the look of their design.
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 to 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!
One of the most common sentences used in typing practice turns
out not to be a pangram at all, though it spewed forth from many
budding typists almost compulsively:
-
Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.
Another sentence comes close to being a pangram (can you spot
the problem?) but is hardly memorable or meaningful:
-
Quiz my black Whigs export fund.
Most pangrams use a few letters several times:
-
Bawds jog, flick quartz, vex nymphs. (28)
-
Few quips galvanized the mock jury box. (32)
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Frowzy things plumb vex'd Jack Q. (27)
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How quickly daft jumping zebras vex. (30)
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Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz. (31)
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Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs. (32)
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Playing jazz vibe chords quickly excites my wife. (41)
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Portez ce vieux whisky au juge blond qui fume. (37)
(French: Take this old whisky to the blond judge who smokes)
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Quick wafting zephyrs vex bold Jim. (29)
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Quick zephyrs blow, vexing daft Jim. (29)
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Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow! (29)
-
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. (35)
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Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud. (28)
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Zany eskimo craves fixed job with quilting party. (41)
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Zweedse ex-VIP, behoorlijk gek op quantum-fyzsica. (41)
(Dutch: Swedish ex-VIP, pretty crazy about quantum physics.)
The best pangrams use each letter exactly once, becoming,
in the process, close to gibberish:
-
Blowzy night-frumps vex'd Jack Q.
-
Bcefghjklmpquvxyz isn't a word.
(Due to Jud Northbark.)
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Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz.
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Fjord-buck zags whelm qvint pyx.
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Frowzy things plumb vex'd Jack Q.
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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.
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Milk-vat fez bugs qoph-crwd jynx.
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Mr Jock, TV quiz PhD, bags few lynx.
-
New job: fix Mr Gluck's hazy TV.
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Squdgy fez, blank jimp crwth vox.
(Due to Claude Shannon, the founder of modern information theory).
-
Warm plucky GHQ jinx, fez to BVD's.
(Reported by Stephen Jay Gould in "The Panda's Thumb of Technology",
as due to Dan Lufkin of Hood College, with the shaggy dog story of
a man attached to general headquarters, regarded as a jinx,
returning from a successful mission wearing only a fez and underwear.
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Vext cwm fly zing jabs Kurd qoph.
-
Zing! Vext cwm fly jabs Kurd qoph.
Last modified on 08 April 2013.