Thought I'd toss a question out into the evening air and see what gets tossed back. I recently read a piece on writing where the author stated that we should not only write stories but make sure that they looked good on the page. Mentioned were such things as plenty of white spaces and artfully arranging your sentences so they looked pleasing to the reader. And no, I'm not kidding about this.
Now, I've seen novels with various types of set-ups. "The Diary of Anne Frank" was published in actual diary form. "Up the Down Staircase" was written in the form of memos, student reports and other various items related to school paperwork. I recently read a short story by Heidi Julavits called "Marry the One Who Gets There First" that was set up in the form of a wedding album with bits of story used as the pictures. An excellent story by the way!
While this works for some stories, I would think after a while it would just seem like a gimmick to the readers. So, you writers out there, do you pay attention to how your story looks on the page? Do you look for gimmicky ways to tell your stories? And readers, do you look to see how much white space is on a page and if the lines are set up in a pleasing manner? Do you like stories that are told in different forms like journals or diaries? Or do you find things like that distracting?
12 comments:
Interesting question. As a reader, for the most part page formatting doesn't bother me (apparently it is required that pages look bizarre when the genre is poetry), because the story is what hooks me, not whether or not a page is pleasing to the eye (however, I have read an old newspaper that was printed on bright yellow paper).
I did find in one story the journal style it was written in kind of distracting but that was just personal preference.
Personally, I don't care how my story looks on paper, so long as its 1) legible 2) no typos and 3) makes sense.
Beyond that I save the gimmicks for the actual content as opposed to visual
At first glance, big blocky paragraphs definitely turn me off. However, there are plenty of writers (Cormac McCarthy, Jose Saramago, Henry James) who do exactly that, but it doesn't matter because they're very good at what they do.
I'd compare it to a book's cover--a page with a lot of white space can push me to take the plunge on a new writer, as I figure the time-investment won't be too high. But, like a book's cover, it doesn't do much other than initially entice me. From there on in, it's all about whether the story is good.
As a reader I'm less likely to pick up a story whose first paragraph takes up most of the page. It simply looks daunting.
As a writer, the only thing I check is that all of my paragraphs and pages don't look the same. Otherwise, it is what it is.
With one exception: when I send it to an editor, I make sure the first page does not end on a completed sentence.
~ Jim
A lot of white space ticks me off. I buy a book for the words, not the paper.
The other things, like diary entries or news articles, I don't mind as long as they really lend something to the book and don't simply distract me from the story. Examples of how good it can be when it works: Craig McDonald's HEAD GAMES (news articles), and Reif Larsen's THE COLLECTED WORKS OF T.S. SPIVET (maps).
Oops! Make that THE SELECTED WORKS OF T.S. SPIVET.
When I wrote poetry (briefly and badly) I gave it some thought. But if you need such flourishes in a story, I'd say the words were not making it work. I don't even like stories in letters to tell the truth.
My goal is to grab the reader by the throat with the opening sentence, pull him/her down into the story, and not let them come up for breath of air until The End. That's what I aim for, whether I achieve it or not. To help with that, I pay attention to the amount of white space on the page, the size of paragraphs, and how punctuation either chops up the reading or lets it
f-l-o-w.
Thanks for a good question, Sandra.
Anonymous-9
Most of the time the writer has little control over this. Otherwise, except in poetry, I don't care at all. I think readers appreciate a lot of white space. I personally don't. the more white space the fewer words I've paid for.
You guys have pretty much summed up what I thought, It's all about the story!
I often wonder if people lay awake at night wondering how to make a writer's life more complicated.
I've heard the "white on the page" thing before--the thinking is that readers are more accustomed nowadays to smaller chunks of text, ala the Internet.
In novels, I'd agree. Short stories, I don't care.
I try.
And I try, to write a lone, singular sentence.
Just as screenwriters do.
Just as Ken Bruen does.
Because sometimes, you just want to emphasize that one sentence, and you want it to shine. Of course someone always edits it into this-
"I try, and I try, to write a singular sentence. Just as screenwriters do. Just as Ken Bruen does."
Yep, we mere mortals always have to follow the "rules", Cormac.
But...
We can dream
of
being gods
One Day!
:)
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