Bedrockgames
Legend
You do not need five sentences for a paragraph
Is RPGing a *literary* endeavour?
Huh? Says who?
Here are the first three paragraphs of REH's The Scarelt Citadel (which was the first story I Googled, knowing that REH doesn't write in too long-winded a fashion):
The roar of battle had died away; the shout of victory mingled with the cries of the dying. Like gay-hued leaves after an autumn storm, the fallen littered the plain; the sinking sun shimmered on burnished helmets, gilt-worked mail, silver breastplates, broken swords and the heavy regal folds of silken standards, overthrown in pools of curdling crimson. In silent heaps lay war- horses and their steel-clad riders, flowing manes and blowing plumes stained alike in the red tide. About them and among them, like the drift of a storm, were strewn slashed and trampled bodies in steel caps and leather jerkins – archers and pikemen.
The oliphants sounded a fanfare of triumph all over the plain, and the hoofs of the victors crunched in the breasts of the vanquished as all the straggling, shining lines converged inward like the spokes of a glittering wheel, to the spot where the last survivor still waged unequal strife.
That day Conan, king of Aquilonia, had seen the pick of his chivalry cut to pieces, smashed and hammered to bits, and swept into eternity. With five thousand knights he had crossed the south-eastern border of Aquilonia and ridden into the grassy meadowlands of Ophir, to find his former ally, King Amalrus of Ophir, drawn up against him with the hosts of Strabonus, king of Koth. Too late he had seen the trap. All that a man might do he had done with his five thousand cavalrymen against the thirty thousand knights, archers and spearmen of the conspirators.
The oliphants sounded a fanfare of triumph all over the plain, and the hoofs of the victors crunched in the breasts of the vanquished as all the straggling, shining lines converged inward like the spokes of a glittering wheel, to the spot where the last survivor still waged unequal strife.
That day Conan, king of Aquilonia, had seen the pick of his chivalry cut to pieces, smashed and hammered to bits, and swept into eternity. With five thousand knights he had crossed the south-eastern border of Aquilonia and ridden into the grassy meadowlands of Ophir, to find his former ally, King Amalrus of Ophir, drawn up against him with the hosts of Strabonus, king of Koth. Too late he had seen the trap. All that a man might do he had done with his five thousand cavalrymen against the thirty thousand knights, archers and spearmen of the conspirators.
The first is four sentences; the second is one; the third is four. The OED defines paragraph as "A distinct section of a piece of writing, usually dealing with a single theme and indicated by a new line, indentation, or numbering." That doesn't seem to me to be a very contentious definition.
I have no idea where your "five sentence" doctrine comes from, but it's not one that professional writers adhere to.
It's pretty tangential to the thread topic, but there is something strange about being schooled on the meaning and connotations of "literary" by someone who asserts such bizarre stuff about the process and structure of wrting.
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
They could be one very long sentence waaaaaay back in the day. Modern paragraph structure is typically 3-8, with 5 being average. Regardless, 3 extra words is not very credible as the breaking point for description length.
Satyrn
First Post
Eh?
I've read a literary work - a modern masterpiece of a novel from a widely acclaimed literary master - where a set of paragraphs were each about one-third of a single sentence.
On top of that, your definition would mean that Agatha Christie had never published a single paragraph in her entire literary career . . . but then that's par for the thread. Pretty much everybody here is equating "literary" with definitions that would place this literary great below many other, lesser writers.
But then I like Agatha Christie, so of course my definition of literary is going to be broad enough to include her - and narrow enough to put her near the top.
Satyrn
First Post
3-8 still puts Christie's lifetime paragraph count around 0.
And that 3-paragraph-long sentence I mentioned comes from Salman Rushdie, a still-living writer. I don't think that fits with your idea of waaaaay back in the day.
Bedrockgames
Legend
This simply isn't true. Paragraphs don't have to be 3-8 sentences.
Bedrockgames
Legend
Regardless of word count, one of those entries (number 2) reads much more like a prose paragraph to me), and the first is essentially just saying it is like the creature from men in black. In the second, listening to every word is important. In the first, there is one thing you need to know.
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
Do you not understand the word "typically?"
Bedrockgames
Legend
Edit: Ooops, wrong post quote
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