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Constrained writing is a literary technique in which the writer is bound by some condition that forbids certain things or imposes a pattern. Constraints are very common in poetry, which often requires the writer to use a particular verse form. The most common constrained forms of writing are strict restrictions in vocabulary, e.g. Basic English, E-Prime, defining vocabulary for dictionaries, and other limited vocabularies for teaching English as a Second Language or to children. This is not generally what is meant by “constrained writing” in the literary sense, which is motivated by more aesthetic concerns. For example: The Oulipo group is a gathering of writers who use such techniques. The Outrapo group use theatrical constraints. Gadsby is an English-language novel consisting of 50,100 words, none of which contain the letter “e.” In 1969, French writer Georges Perec published La Disparition, a novel that did not include the letter “e.” It was translated into English in 1995 by Gilbert Adair as “A Void.” Perec subsequently joked that he incorporated the "e"s not used in La Disparition in the novella Les Revenentes (1972), which uses no vowels other than "e". Les Revenentes was translated into English by Ian Monk as The Exeter Text: Jewels, Secrets, Sex. In 2004, a new marvel from France: a novel, entirely without verbs: Le Train de Nulle Part (“The Train from Nowhere”) by Michel Thaler. * Experimental Canadian poet Christian Bök's Eunoia is a lipogram that uses only one vowel in each of its five chapters One famous constrained writing in the Chinese language is the Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den which consists of 92 characters, all with the sound shi. Another is the Thousand Character Classic in which all 1000 characters are unique without any repetition. Cadaeic Cadenza is a short book by Mike Keith using the digits of pi as the length of words.
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