SO BAD IT'S GOOD SPACE OPERA PARODY HAS PLENTY OF POWER.

Byline: Mary Schubert Staff Writer

PASADENA - Computer technician and aspiring screenwriter Ken Jessup was out to prove that he could be just as much of a hack as the next guy - and he convinced the judges of a satirical writing competition.

Jessup, who works for a Pasadena advertising agency, was selected a runner-up in the annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, placing second in the science fiction category with his parody of a space yarn.

A sci-fi fan who insists he doesn't own any pointy Spock ears, Jessup said his 82-word entry came out of his ``twisted'' imagination.

``I love science fiction. That's why I love to make fun of it,'' the Glendale resident said.

``I was poking fun at 'space operas' ... so I had the Starship dancing on the edge of destruction,'' explained Jessup, 39. ``I wanted to juxtapose all this melodrama with this guy waiting for the door to go 'ding.' ''

The contest, begun in 1982 at San Jose State University, pays tongue- in-cheek homage to now-obscure 19th-century British novelist Edward George Bulwer-Lytton.

Though not a household name, Bulwer-Lytton coined some well-known phrases: ``the great unwashed,'' ``The pen is mightier than the sword,'' and - in a line that inspired the contest - ``It was a dark and stormy night.''

Those seven words opened Bulwer-Lytton's 1830 novel ``Paul Clifford.'' But they were made famous by a cartoon beagle perched atop his doghouse, hunched over a typewriter.

In numerous ``Peanuts'' comic strips, Snoopy used the ``dark and stormy night'' passage as a launching point for his own purple prose.

Scott Rice, a San Jose State English professor, came upon the author of the oft-repeated sentence while writing a graduate school paper. He and the university's English department created the contest as ``a whimsical literary competition that challenges entrants to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels.''

Only three people entered that inaugural contest; the 2001 edition drew thousands of participants from all over the world. Winners were announced Monday.

Sera Kirk, a 44-year-old legal secretary in Vancouver, British Columbia, won the grand prize:

``A small assortment of astonishingly loud brass instruments raced each other lustily to the respective ends of their distinct musical choices as the gates flew open to release a torrent of tawny fur comprised of angry yapping bullets that nipped at Desdemona's ankles, causing her to reflect once again (as blood filled her sneakers and she fought her way through the panicking crowd) that the annual Running of the Pomeranians in Liechtenstein was a stupid idea.''

Winners and runners-up were named in various categories, but only Kirk took home a cash award.

It's $250, for the record, though Rice jokes that ``in keeping with the character and dignity of the contest, we prefer to describe it as: the winner receives a pittance.''

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Photo:

Ken Jessup of Glendale, a computer technician, is savoring the news that he was runner-up in a satirical fiction contest.

Walt Mancini/Staff Photographer