Sentence Length
So it begins.
Whether you write novels, blogs, or fan-fiction, you are going to type sentences. Short sentences. The average length of six words. Sometimes, when you simply cannot help yourself, you write a longer sentence, one with commas, one that stretches across your screen or paper. That is perfectly fine.
If we all wrote sentence that were only six words, or only extremely long, writing would get boring. Imagine if we all wrote only wrote short, 1-5 word-long sentences!
("Hello." I smiled. They smiled. I walked away. "Good bye." The End.)
That would be so dull.
That is why we all write different lengths. Here in this post, I'll explore when you should probably use each type. If you have any additions, questions, or corrections, leave them in the comments and I'll respond!
Action scenes: where everything moves around. If you've been looking up writing tips recently, you may already know this trick: Short sentences. Does this always work?
(She yelped. Fell backwards. Spinning. Tripping. Crashing. Pressed against the sand. She grimaced.)
Yikes. Most of the sentences back there were 1-2 words long. One of them is a fragment! Actually, it isn't that bad. It speeds the pace. But if we tweak it up a little, maybe we can make it better.
(She yelped, falling backwards, spinning, tripping, and crashing; she grimaced, pressed against the sand.)
Huh. Combining most of the sentences into one long, comma-filled sentence has a different style. I also reversed the last phrases. Which one is better? It depends on your style. Let's try the medium sentence next!
(She yelped, and fell backwards. Spinning, tripping, and crashing. She grimaced, pressed against the sand.)
This one is nicer, but it doesn't give me the same pressured feel as the short sentences. It doesn't have the darting phrases of the long sentence. What's my problem? It's too orderly. If you've been a writer for long, you know that order is not the number one thing on our list. Sure, we want our work to be readable, but action scenes scream for chaos.
Which style do we want? What if we combined two of them?
(She yelped. Falling backwards, spinning, tripping, crashing, she grimaced. Pressed against the sand.)
(She yelped, falling backwards. Spinning, tripping, crashing. Pressed against the sand, she grimaced.)
So those are a few examples. Which one do you like better? Do you have a better option? Leave one in the comments. Thanks for reading, and I hope this helps!
Whether you write novels, blogs, or fan-fiction, you are going to type sentences. Short sentences. The average length of six words. Sometimes, when you simply cannot help yourself, you write a longer sentence, one with commas, one that stretches across your screen or paper. That is perfectly fine.
If we all wrote sentence that were only six words, or only extremely long, writing would get boring. Imagine if we all wrote only wrote short, 1-5 word-long sentences!
("Hello." I smiled. They smiled. I walked away. "Good bye." The End.)
That would be so dull.
That is why we all write different lengths. Here in this post, I'll explore when you should probably use each type. If you have any additions, questions, or corrections, leave them in the comments and I'll respond!
Action scenes: where everything moves around. If you've been looking up writing tips recently, you may already know this trick: Short sentences. Does this always work?
(She yelped. Fell backwards. Spinning. Tripping. Crashing. Pressed against the sand. She grimaced.)
Yikes. Most of the sentences back there were 1-2 words long. One of them is a fragment! Actually, it isn't that bad. It speeds the pace. But if we tweak it up a little, maybe we can make it better.
(She yelped, falling backwards, spinning, tripping, and crashing; she grimaced, pressed against the sand.)
Huh. Combining most of the sentences into one long, comma-filled sentence has a different style. I also reversed the last phrases. Which one is better? It depends on your style. Let's try the medium sentence next!
(She yelped, and fell backwards. Spinning, tripping, and crashing. She grimaced, pressed against the sand.)
This one is nicer, but it doesn't give me the same pressured feel as the short sentences. It doesn't have the darting phrases of the long sentence. What's my problem? It's too orderly. If you've been a writer for long, you know that order is not the number one thing on our list. Sure, we want our work to be readable, but action scenes scream for chaos.
Which style do we want? What if we combined two of them?
(She yelped. Falling backwards, spinning, tripping, crashing, she grimaced. Pressed against the sand.)
(She yelped, falling backwards. Spinning, tripping, crashing. Pressed against the sand, she grimaced.)
So those are a few examples. Which one do you like better? Do you have a better option? Leave one in the comments. Thanks for reading, and I hope this helps!
Comments
Post a Comment