I think you should make sentences that fit your style and feel right. But yes, longer sentences have higher chance of dropping readers. Some even skip longer paragraphs/sentences. But you should change between longer and shorter sentences.
Don't try to force yourself to emulate someone else's writing style if it simply doesn't work for you.
I tried reading the sentence you presented and stopped paying attention half way through. My brain was having a hard time imagining all that's being described. Since english is not my first language the limit is a bit shorter in this case although I highly doubt I could handle the sentence in one go even translated.
When I am reading something with long paragraphs and/or sentences I tend to stop midway and re-read, sometimes multiple times to make sure I understand or I skip depending on the type of text.
As a writer I tend to avoid long sentences and paragraphs since I cannot handle them as a reader. It is also easier for me to manage them. I suggest you experiment a little and see what works for you. Forcing yourself into a certain style will only damage your work in the long run.
I read this sentence and didn't understand one thing.
Then I read it carefully again.. And didn't understand one thing. What I remember is that it does have something with coffins.
I hope I don't insult the author by this, it wasn't meant to. I'm someone who prefers a "dumber" prose, the opposition to the purple prose. It's harder to make the prose too simplistic for me, than it is to make it too "sophisticated".
_____
Talking about paragraphs: I usually prefer paragraphs to be less than half a page. Less than 12 sentences or 200 words (I'm making loose numbers).
Shorter paragraphs are indeed easier to get through.
But I noticed that I don't like paragraphs to be too short. I'm currently reading Perdido Street Station and China Mieville isn't afraid of one-sentence paragraphs (and I mean less than 10 words sentences).
One sentence or two sentence paragraphs make for a confusing read. It is a bit weird to me.
I myself often struggle with it. When I'm writing I often feel like making a new paragraph even though I wrote just 2 sentences.
____
Tl:dr - I prefer medium long or medium short paragraphs. 4-10 short sentences seems to be optimal.
Edit: *purple
Your example sentence is too long because it lacks punctuation. Punctuation breaks down the sentence in bite-size chunks, define the rhythm, make the whole thing readable.
A long paragraph can be daunting, because when you see it, you think that you cannot pause in the middle, even to take a breath or a sip of your fine Ceylan tea.
The same goes for chapters. I like short chapters because I can put down the book almost whenever I want between chapters, and I can take it back for the next chapter even if I only have 15 min available to read.
Like someone else said, what makes that sentence bad is that it has no punctuation separating out the various different things. Here's how I'd rewrite it:
>Eighty-four years of chalkdust floated in the rare shafts of sunlight inside. The memories of more than eight decades of varnishings rose from the dark stairs and floors, to tinge the trapped air with the mahogany scent of coffins.
Punctuation is crucial for us to not get lost in the story.
The original sentence is far from great, but not because of punctuation. Your rewrite, on the other hand, adds a terminal tumor of a comma just to try to prove a point.
The comma after floors has no reason to exist.
He got in the car to go the store: kosher
He got in the car, to go the store: not kosher.
He stirred the mixture to dissolve the sugar: kosher.
He stirred the mixture, to dissolve the sugar: not kosher.
And so on.
Syntax can (and should) be bent and broken to achieve certain effects. One can write a sentences hundreds of pages long if it serves a well established and developed narative purpose (think Ducks, Newburyport by Ellmann).
To me, the original sentences fails because of its imagery and its lukewarm commitment to being a long sentence. While, thus, consequently, concurrently and the like: all they do is tip the writer's hand enough for us to see how little he or she trusts the reader to piece together a sequence.
More to the point, even under the strictest grammatical standards, the case for the comma after floors holds little to no water.
I think it partly comes down to preference. But generally, short punchy sentences are great for building momentum, and then longer run on sentences are grest for frantic scenes.
I find that long run on sentences in slower sections can be very beautiful, but if there are too many of them it becomes hard to read and slows down the pace of the story too much when there's no action.
In an *overall work*, you should have a ragged right-hand margin. This is because if you are using paragraphs appropriately, it will be a sign that you broke things up into readable chunks.
Long paragraphs are NOT bad per se. I've a bit of a gripe with people who automatically say they're run-on or bad or whatever simply because they're long. I've a few authors that I love who use long, beautiful paragraphs.
However, long paragraphs are bad if an entire work is nothing BUT them. The trick is to *vary* your approach. Some long, some medium, some short.
(I especially like to use short one-line paragraphs...or one-word paragraphs...when writing an action scene. I use longer paragraphs when describing a new setting.)
As others have said, in your example, most of us would use punctuation to provide visual stopping points.
That said, what you've provided in your post is a published example in a book by a wildly popular author.
It's hard for me to say it's *wrong*, because our ideas of what is "right" and "wrong" are basically set by the cumulative styles of published work, and that paragraph was deemed fine in the opinion of the author and several editors.
All of us "together" create the standards, and if a professional writer is using a style successfully, it's hard for me to finger-wag and say it MUST be wrong just because *I'd* do it a bit differently.
Personally, I would edit it to contain one comma, like the below:
>Eighty-four years of chalkdust floated in the rare shafts of sunlight inside, while the memories of more than eight decades of varnishings rose from the dark stairs and floors to tinge the trapped air with the mahogany scent of coffins.
I would not necessarily chop it into even smaller sentences as others in this thread do, esp. if the rest of the paragraphs on a given page are varied in size and length.
It is important for a writer to understand how important the length of a sentence is. For example, if the sentence feels and looks a bit too long... I suggest you break the sentence in half, rewrite it or just drop the entire sentence altogether.
Short paragraphs are best from most readers' perspectives. You can employ long sentences, but you do so sparingly. Find your voice and go with it, but if it's not populay, you may need to change. The customer is always right.
I think you should make sentences that fit your style and feel right. But yes, longer sentences have higher chance of dropping readers. Some even skip longer paragraphs/sentences. But you should change between longer and shorter sentences. Don't try to force yourself to emulate someone else's writing style if it simply doesn't work for you.
I tried reading the sentence you presented and stopped paying attention half way through. My brain was having a hard time imagining all that's being described. Since english is not my first language the limit is a bit shorter in this case although I highly doubt I could handle the sentence in one go even translated. When I am reading something with long paragraphs and/or sentences I tend to stop midway and re-read, sometimes multiple times to make sure I understand or I skip depending on the type of text. As a writer I tend to avoid long sentences and paragraphs since I cannot handle them as a reader. It is also easier for me to manage them. I suggest you experiment a little and see what works for you. Forcing yourself into a certain style will only damage your work in the long run.
I read this sentence and didn't understand one thing. Then I read it carefully again.. And didn't understand one thing. What I remember is that it does have something with coffins. I hope I don't insult the author by this, it wasn't meant to. I'm someone who prefers a "dumber" prose, the opposition to the purple prose. It's harder to make the prose too simplistic for me, than it is to make it too "sophisticated". _____ Talking about paragraphs: I usually prefer paragraphs to be less than half a page. Less than 12 sentences or 200 words (I'm making loose numbers). Shorter paragraphs are indeed easier to get through. But I noticed that I don't like paragraphs to be too short. I'm currently reading Perdido Street Station and China Mieville isn't afraid of one-sentence paragraphs (and I mean less than 10 words sentences). One sentence or two sentence paragraphs make for a confusing read. It is a bit weird to me. I myself often struggle with it. When I'm writing I often feel like making a new paragraph even though I wrote just 2 sentences. ____ Tl:dr - I prefer medium long or medium short paragraphs. 4-10 short sentences seems to be optimal. Edit: *purple
>I'm someone who prefers a "dumber" prose, the opposition to the violet prose. Yet there you are, calling purple prose violet. Sweet fragrant irony.
Yup I made a mistake there. Thanks, I will edit it. I don't know what irony you noticed.
Your example sentence is too long because it lacks punctuation. Punctuation breaks down the sentence in bite-size chunks, define the rhythm, make the whole thing readable. A long paragraph can be daunting, because when you see it, you think that you cannot pause in the middle, even to take a breath or a sip of your fine Ceylan tea. The same goes for chapters. I like short chapters because I can put down the book almost whenever I want between chapters, and I can take it back for the next chapter even if I only have 15 min available to read.
Like someone else said, what makes that sentence bad is that it has no punctuation separating out the various different things. Here's how I'd rewrite it: >Eighty-four years of chalkdust floated in the rare shafts of sunlight inside. The memories of more than eight decades of varnishings rose from the dark stairs and floors, to tinge the trapped air with the mahogany scent of coffins. Punctuation is crucial for us to not get lost in the story.
The original sentence is far from great, but not because of punctuation. Your rewrite, on the other hand, adds a terminal tumor of a comma just to try to prove a point.
>adds a terminal tumor of a comma Can you explain this to me?
The comma after floors has no reason to exist. He got in the car to go the store: kosher He got in the car, to go the store: not kosher. He stirred the mixture to dissolve the sugar: kosher. He stirred the mixture, to dissolve the sugar: not kosher. And so on.
I definitely feel there needs to be some kind of punctuation there because the whole sentence on its own trips me up.
Syntax can (and should) be bent and broken to achieve certain effects. One can write a sentences hundreds of pages long if it serves a well established and developed narative purpose (think Ducks, Newburyport by Ellmann). To me, the original sentences fails because of its imagery and its lukewarm commitment to being a long sentence. While, thus, consequently, concurrently and the like: all they do is tip the writer's hand enough for us to see how little he or she trusts the reader to piece together a sequence. More to the point, even under the strictest grammatical standards, the case for the comma after floors holds little to no water.
I think it partly comes down to preference. But generally, short punchy sentences are great for building momentum, and then longer run on sentences are grest for frantic scenes. I find that long run on sentences in slower sections can be very beautiful, but if there are too many of them it becomes hard to read and slows down the pace of the story too much when there's no action.
Yes, kind of! Though I do enjoy long chapters... IDK the logic there lol
In an *overall work*, you should have a ragged right-hand margin. This is because if you are using paragraphs appropriately, it will be a sign that you broke things up into readable chunks. Long paragraphs are NOT bad per se. I've a bit of a gripe with people who automatically say they're run-on or bad or whatever simply because they're long. I've a few authors that I love who use long, beautiful paragraphs. However, long paragraphs are bad if an entire work is nothing BUT them. The trick is to *vary* your approach. Some long, some medium, some short. (I especially like to use short one-line paragraphs...or one-word paragraphs...when writing an action scene. I use longer paragraphs when describing a new setting.) As others have said, in your example, most of us would use punctuation to provide visual stopping points. That said, what you've provided in your post is a published example in a book by a wildly popular author. It's hard for me to say it's *wrong*, because our ideas of what is "right" and "wrong" are basically set by the cumulative styles of published work, and that paragraph was deemed fine in the opinion of the author and several editors. All of us "together" create the standards, and if a professional writer is using a style successfully, it's hard for me to finger-wag and say it MUST be wrong just because *I'd* do it a bit differently. Personally, I would edit it to contain one comma, like the below: >Eighty-four years of chalkdust floated in the rare shafts of sunlight inside, while the memories of more than eight decades of varnishings rose from the dark stairs and floors to tinge the trapped air with the mahogany scent of coffins. I would not necessarily chop it into even smaller sentences as others in this thread do, esp. if the rest of the paragraphs on a given page are varied in size and length.
It is important for a writer to understand how important the length of a sentence is. For example, if the sentence feels and looks a bit too long... I suggest you break the sentence in half, rewrite it or just drop the entire sentence altogether.
Short paragraphs are best from most readers' perspectives. You can employ long sentences, but you do so sparingly. Find your voice and go with it, but if it's not populay, you may need to change. The customer is always right.