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Until Friday, 23 December 2011 to give you time to recover from your office party and the 5 hours of sitting in traffic going to and from the party.

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How different would The Lord of the Rings, Othello, The Once and Future King, Sherlock Holmes, Superman, Noli me tangere and Pride and Prejudice be if they were told from the point of view of Sauron, Iago, Mordred, Professor Moriarty, Lex Luthor, Padre Damaso or that bitch Caroline Bingley?

How would the villain view the situation?

Kirill Yeskov retold the epic of Middle Earth from the perspective of the Orcs of Mordor, and George R.R. Martin keeps his fantasy series interesting by having it narrated by both heroes and villains. John Gardner’s Grendel is a retelling of Beowulf from the POV of the monster.

Your assignment this week, should you choose to accept it, is to sum up a novel or play from the point of view of its villain. How would Dr. Valentina Vrandakapoor, Ph.D. in Reptilian Zoology from the University of New Delhi, characterize Darna? What would Karla have to say about the Circus in the Smiley novels?

1,000 words or less, due at 12 noon on Saturday, 17 December 2011. The prize is this huge reference book on Mythology, which is also useful as a coffee table.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.

has been chosen by the Yucch-meter.

Porn addict by suresuresure: Written for shock effect, not shocking at all.

Cussing addict by Meng: There is an actual condition known as Tourette’s Syndrome. Look it up.

Palabok addict by kidnapmeimrich: Cute, but not an addiction.

Facebook addict by tita: Good. Sounds real.

Dating site addict by angus25: Very interesting, but the narrator thinks too much to be an addict in the grip of his impulses. He’s just lonely, that’s not a disorder.

OC-OC by samutsari: Obsessive-compulsive behavior is similar but not the same as addiction.

Dating older men by cake: Not an addiction, a daddy complex.

Blogging addict by joyeah: Sounds like a real person: furtive, embarrassed at her condition but unable to stop herself. The narrator is believably dorky and borderline incoherent. We have a winner.

Congratulations, joyeah, you are the winner of LitWit 7.9. Please post your full name in Comments and we’ll alert you when your prize can be picked up.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore. The next LitWit Challenge is coming up.

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joyeah, you or your representative can pick up your books at the Customer Service counter of National Bookstore in Power Plant Mall, Rockwell, Makati, any day starting Saturday 17 December 2011. Just give your full name when you claim your prize.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge 7.9: Addictions is no longer accepting entries. We’re very pleased to see stories from first-time participants. The winner will be announced in a day or two.

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Until we can lay eyes on the actual movie we’ve been reading the reviews of Shame by Steve McQueen. As you know it is about a sex addict played by Michael Fassbender. The reviews have been mixed—many critics have noted that the sex is the movie is strangely non-erotic. Since the protagonist is a sex addict, isn’t that the point?

This got us to thinking about addictions and how at some point the substance, thing, or activity one is addicted to ceases to be fun. Sounds like material for a LitWit challenge.

In 1,000 words or less, write us a story from the POV of an addict who no longer enjoys whatever it is they’re addicted to (sex, drugs, alcohol, shopping, whatever) but can’t bring themselves to stop.

The deadline is noon on Saturday, 10 December 2011. The winner will receive these three books: The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John LeCarré, and Faceless Killers by Henning Mankell.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.

Thank you for following the Weekly LitWit Challenge. Unfortunately the volunteer English teaching program we had planned fell through, but yesterday we turned over a donation of school supplies to NBS Foundation’s Project Aral. In the coming months we will make regular donations to schools in need.

This is the painful/hilarious intervention scene from Breaking Bad.

We asked brewhuh23 and Momelia to serve as the jury for this week’s LitWit Challenge.

# 15 scientist
brewhuh23: Short, straight to the point, awaaard!
Momelia: Needs salt.

# 14 scientist
Momelia: It’s Reverse Psychology with a minty fresh scent.

# 13 Ligayaparaiso
Momelia: I do believe, as a homosexual, ladies and gentlemen and city councilors, that the realism in this letter is just too adorable! It’s the gayspeak, however, that turns me off. It’s not spontaneous enough. It’s too planned. But I still like this letter because it’s very real.

# 12 january jam
Momelia: It’s an easy read, but the sentences aren’t “fun” enough. He can try to loosen up.

# 11 samutsari
Momelia: It’s the kind of comedy in the truly comic Tagalog films of the 80s and 90s that I miss today. The way this letter was written brings that kind of funny to mind, for some reason.

# 10 Evan
Momelia: I don’t see how it can intervene if it’s too insecure to be taken seriously. Pogi points because he’s Pogi, but that’s not a valid currency.
Us: P.S. Girls don’t have penises.

# 9 illiterati
Momelia: Vanilla.

# 7 MewMew
Momelia: I will not meddle with this entry, just so we’re clear. Wahaha!

# 6 kidnapmeimrich
Momelia: The friend’s no longer in a relationship, the writer’s sour graping on her friend’s behalf, this could be a winner, but I don’t think this is an intervention, so no.
brewhuh23: Parang similar kami ng sasabihin sa mga friends naming shunga in love.

# 5 stellalehua
Momelia: Now this is the kind of no holds barred shit that I expect to hear from my offline friends. This is an intervention.

# 4 overhyped
Momelia: Somebody’s been applying too much black eyeliner.

# 3 BolgaTheTranny
Momelia: The line “your boyfriend’s armpit smells like a labia in full bloom” was a real turnoff.

# 2 johnbristol6
Momelia: This letter’s a killer! I love it because it’s got the right measures of sense and silliness. The silly might have overflowed some, but that’s just the way I like it.
Us: Clever but over-written. Suma-Star Cinema.

# 1 fromdavaowithpimples
Momelia: The rules asked for an intervention. He submitted a proposal. No points, sir, see you next season.
brewhuh23: I thought the ending was sweet. I’m a sucker for people in love with their best friends.

As the jury could not agree on a winner, we had to pick the winner ourselves (so much for outsourcing). It’s samutsari. Her story feels like real life, and it’s funny without trying too much.

Congratulations, samutsari. You can pick up your prize (under your real name, thanks for the quick response) at the Customer Service Counter of National Bookstore at Power Plant Mall, Rockwell, Makati.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.

Obviously you are deeply moved by recent revelations in the form of non-revelations so let’s LitWit this to death. Here is the situation: Your dear friend is in love with a totally unsuitable person who is perfect on paper but is really not good for them. And they know it but out of pride or obstinacy (because everyone warned them this would happen but they went ahead anyway) or masochism or contractual obligations they refuse to get out.

Write this dear friend of yours a letter in 1,000 words or less telling them the awful truth and urging them to save themselves. If you need inspiration read this famous letter.

Post your letter in Comments on or before Saturday, 3 December 2011 at 12 noon. The winner will receive these books:

Now go.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.

The winner is VenusdeSupsup! Congratulations, Venus, you may pick up your stack of books at the Customer Service counter of National Bookstore, Power Plant Mall, Rockwell, Makati. Just give them the email address you used to register here.

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We have five contenders for this week’s LitWit Challenge, Leila v Gloria. Less than we’d expected given the media storm, but not a bad effort at all. Now it’s time to pick the winner, and to make things more interesting we’ve decided to let you be the judge.

Read the 5 entries in Comments, and then vote for the playlet you like best.

We’re accepting votes until 4.44am tomorrow, 28 November 2011.

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That’s all you’ve got? Real life smacks you in the face with material and this is it? The lowliest baklita sweeping hair off the floor of the corner P20-peso haircut beauty parlor could do better. Hell, straight guys could do better.

The contest is extended until noon tomorrow, Sunday 27 November.

Classic bitch: Bette Davis in All About Eve, not to be confused with Korean soap

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There are many great plays with only two or three characters: Harold Pinter’s Betrayal (one married couple, one friend, infidelity), Michael Frayn’s Copenhagen (Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, Nazi Germany and the Bomb), Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot (Vladimir, Estragon, a couple of extras, Godot does not arrive).

For the Weekly LitWit Challenge 7.7 you’re going to write us a scene for a play with two or three characters. The protagonists are Justice Secretary Leila De Lima, the former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, and President Benigno Aquino III (optional).

Maximum word count: 2,000 words
Deadline for submissions: 11.59 pm, Friday, 25 November 2011.
Post your entry in Comments.The prize is this stack of books.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John LeCarré, Ransom by David Malouf, The Last Station by Jay Parini, The Man in the Yellow Doublet by Arturo Perez Reverte, The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell, and Lush Life by Richard Price.

Give us something Nora and Vilma or Meryl and Judi or Dakota and Elle can sink their teeth into.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.