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Similar length paragraphs

edited January 2014 in - Writing Problems
Does anyone else suffer from a subconscious tendency to write similar length paragraphs? It happens to me a lot and makes the article or story look strange if I don't do something about it.

Comments

  • Not really, DB, because if speech is involved, I start a new line which breaks it all up quite nicely.

    I don't like lengthy paragraphs. I go out of my way to break them up. If you look at them on a kindle, they look a little overwhelming!
  • I should have said this occurs mainly with non-fiction, though it's happening in a short story I'm writing which doesn't have any dialogue for a few hundred words.
  • Like TN, I keep my paragraphs fairly short where the dialogue doesn't do that naturally.
  • Yes, I think I would try to keep an even length in non-fiction and pure narrative, DB, just for the sake of aesthetics.
  • [quote=Tiny Nell]Yes, I think I would try to keep an even length in non-fiction and pure narrative, DB, just for the sake of aesthetics. [/quote]

    Hmm, that's interesting. I think that having lots of similar length paragraphs looks unnatural, even though I find myself doing it naturally :-)
  • Identical would look unnatural, I agree, but a line or two more or less here and there would help to make it less contrived. You have to include what you have to include so it's not always possible to be regimented, but a very long paragraph can usually be split somewhere.
  • Surely the content dictates when a new paragraph is needed?
  • edited January 2014
    Agree, Baggy. And also what you're writing about.

    If you're writing a love scene for example where there's emotional intensity, you don't want short sharp sentences/paragraphs, but if you have an argument that's quite intense then very short sentences and paragraphs are required.

    So I write to the requirements of the characters and the scene.
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