Abling python test attempt

worktext='''Now
is the time
for all good-men
to come to the-
aid of -their
party. NOW IS THE TIME FOR all Good men to
come to the AID of their party. party-their now-is time-the-for all-good
men to -come aid of party a&b%c*(d)
a1b2c3d4-
a
  b
 b  c   defg
thisisaverylongWORDwithnospacesbetweenthewordsandhowwillitbehandled?
thisisaverylongWORDwithnospacesbetweenthewordsandhowwillitbehandled2?
thisisaverylongWORDwithnospacesbetweenthewordsandhowwillitbehandled3?

!"£$%^&*()''' #I don't actually know file I/O in python yet, sorry
              #Hopefully this isn't a problem! :)

worktext=worktext.lower() #Make all letters lowercase before starting

currword='' #Hold words in progress
ansmap={} #Using a dict to map 'word':appearancecount

for currchar in worktext:
  if currchar.isalpha():
    currword+=currchar
  elif currword: #Checking currword to avoid counting empty words
    try: #Let's not assume currword is in ansmap.
      ansmap[currword]+=1
    except:
      ansmap[currword]=1
    currword='' #remember to reset the current word upon reaching its end!
#Since the for loop only adds words upon reaching a non-letter/word separator,
#if there is a word at the end of the file it will not be counted.
if currword:
  try:
    ansmap[currword]+=1
  except:
    ansmap[currword]=1
#Now ansmap contains all of the words. I could print them out now, but
#they are not in alphabetical order as required by the problem, so I
#will put them in a list first and use the built-in list.sort() method.
wordnumlist=[]
for currword in ansmap:
  wordnumlist+=[(currword,ansmap[currword])]
wordnumlist.sort()
for currtuple in wordnumlist:
  print currtuple[0]+': '+str(currtuple[1])