Long Narrative/ Vignette Stories

yukonnights said:

I hesitate to say anything here; But I'm picturing a story that is in essence a looking back over a shared lifetime. The use of a vignette seems a useful device to me to both breakup the long narrative in places and provide a more detailed recollection of certain special moments. Such a break could be easily identified with formatting style.

I've seen this done in movies in a positive way. Perhaps an object or event within the narrative prompts a "daydream" of the day that such and such happened. I would assume these would be reflections on the major highs and lows of the lives being told, etc.

Also, it seems the use of any "flashbacks/vignettes" would be really very much dependent on who is doing the narration.

I think I would enjoy such a side trips myself.

Click to expand...

MelissaBaby said:

Aesthetically, I don't like the "feel" of Chapter five covering events over the course of a year, chapter six covering a year, chapter seven taking place in a couple of hours, Chapter eight back to being a year...

Not that is can't work well, but it just doesn't seem to fit with how I work things. You've made a good case that I should reconsider that.

Click to expand...

MelissaBaby said:

I'm not sure I am following you on that, Ogg. Or perhaps I have not articulated my question well enough.

Click to expand...

yukonnights said:

I was envisioning the vignettes (flashbacks?) being inserted within the chapter in which they were triggered. Obviously we're all coming at this with how "we think" the story is unfolding. In essence, in my mind, it would be a pause within the chapter to look back at the "event" that I thought needed a little more depth than narration could provide. These 'pauses' could occur throughout the chapters of the story wherever they were needed. But without knowing the story, and who's narrating it, it's hard to know if this is needed or possible...just a thought.

Click to expand...

oggbashan said:

Or perhaps I didn't answer clearly.

What I meant was that there are two types of chapter on Literotica.

One is a chapter that has a start, a development and an ending, and sometimes a cliff-hanger for the next chapter. That would be posted as a submission on its own and followed by the next chapter as another submission.

The second is a subdivision with a story, perhaps to indicate a change of time or location, an account from another person's point of view, or an aside from the main story - 'meanwhile character x is doing this'. Those sort of chapters would include your vignettes, marked internally as chapters but not entities to be posted alone. A group of those chapters could form a Part 01, 02 or whatever that has a start, development and ending when posted together. That Part would be followed by another Part that would have several internal chapters.

Click to expand...

MelissaBaby said:

The vignettes would not be flashbacks, but stand alone stories with the same characters that don't advance the narrative.

I'll give an example. A friend of mine told me an anecdote about a couple he knows. The husband is significantly older than his wife, as is the case with Alvin and Mary.They were out of town, attending some sort of convention. They were having a nightcap in the hotel bar, when a beautiful young woman sat down next to them and started chatting.

It turned out, the woman was an escort. She had gotten a call from her agency or booker or whoever, telling her that one of their girls, who she did not know, had a client who was asking for a threesome, and she'd been sent to join them. She was told they'd be in the bar, and when she arrived, she mistook the couple for the client and the other escort.

Lots of good story possibilities there, and I honestly don't know yet how Mary and Alvin would respond. The issue is, if let's say one chapter revolves around their wedding, another around the birth of their child, etc., a chapter within the main narrative based on such an anecdote would, it seems to me, elevate it to a place in their story that is out of proportion to it's actual importance. So, I am thinking that, if I tell that tale, it ought to stand aside.

I hope that clarifies my thinking on the subject.

Click to expand...