Member-only story
A palindrome is a word or a sentence that reads the same forward as it does backward. There is no upper limit to how long a palindrome can be. Believe it or not, some audacious writers have written entire novels in the palindromic form! Now that’s a nightmare for any book editor.
In 1986, Lawrence Levine wrote a palindromic novel of 31,957 words, Dr. Awkward and Olson in Oslo. In 1980, David Stephens wrote a 58,000 letter palindrome “Satire: Veritas”.
Can you imagine writing or editing a book like that? How do you keep track of the words? The sentences? The story? The plot? It all seems so convoluted! The writers were crazy to attempt a feat like that. They either enjoyed the process or hated it, but persisted just so they could achieve that milestone.
Having to work on a book like that can give any editor a phobia of palindromes. If that weren’t enough, whoever coined the word for that phobia has got to be evil. Because Aibohphobia — the word for phobias of palindromes (yes, it’s a thing) is exactly that, a palindrome!
Let’s take a look at some shorter examples of this strangeness:
Just get them flying cars already
– Are we not drawn onward to new era?
