Gadsby: A Story of Over 50,000 Words Without Using the Letter "E" is a 1939 novel by Ernest Vincent Wright. The plot revolves around the dying fictional city of Branton Hills, which is revitalized thanks to the efforts of protagonist John Gadsby and a youth group he organizes. The novel is written as a lipogram and does not include words that contain the letter "e". Though self-published and little-noticed in its time, the book is a favorite of fans of constrained writing and is a sought-after rarity among some book collectors. Later editions of the book have sometimes carried the alternative... subtitle: 50,000 Word Novel Without the Letter "E". In 1968, the novel entered the public domain in the United States due to failure to renew copyright in the 28th year after publication. The novel's 50,110 words do not contain a single e. In Gadsby's introduction Wright says his primary difficulty was avoiding the "-ed" suffix for past tense verbs. He focused on using verbs that do not take the -ed suffix and constructions with "do" . Scarcity of word options also drastically limited discussion involving quantity, pronouns, and many common words.
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