The Truth about Drabbles

[louiselux]

I want to know what you all think about drabbles. For me, the best drabbles have an impact that is inversely proportional to their size-- they hit the reader round the face with the all the force of a large well-swung haddock. That's what I aspire to, anyway, one day. I also tend to think that to do that they require a lot of time and effort.
[Poll #385199]

Comments

Re: *Squee*, drabbles: one of my favorite subjects¹ (so I have much to say, beware)

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

Another very important characteristic to me (though I don't I've seen this discussed much/ever), is the amount of reader inference:

It's interesting that this point has come up in what other people say - obviously people don't like their drabbles to be merely an easy read, and that for me ties in with the idea of it having impact-- a drabble should have implications, and those implications should grow on you. Well, I say 'should', but there's clearly no right way to write anything.

As to what to call non-drabbles - I tend to call them very short stories or vignettes. The purist in me says that people shouldn't call anything over 100 words a drabble, but in reality I can't make myself to care too much.

I really like the point you make about stopping at some point. I think I spend too long on drabbles and probably should learn to drop things if they're not working, but it's similar to 'how long is a piece of string'. How long do you spend before you give up.

[skuf.livejournal.com]

Vignettes are a specific genre, too, though - just because something is short, it's not automatically a vignette.

I really like the point you make about stopping at some point.
I meant as far as interpretation goes: I don't believe in infinite interpretation of a text - and certainly not of a drabble. But it's also true that if a drabble is not working, one should let it go :o)