On 'actual' Chapters

[TheRedChamber]

"Complete amateur...doesn't even write in chapters." - the literary critic Tom Paulin on Terry Pratchett, subsequently used as a quote on the back of his books.

Don't worry, this isn't another thread about how many individual Literotica submissions to break a work into (be they called chapters, parts or whatever). I'm in the middle of rewriting a novel-length story that has sat for some considerable time and was adding some scenes to the beginning. As this was an experimental change, I started with a new file and added 'chapter one', 'chapter two' for each scene before remembering I hadn't used chapters for the original draft (although, as above, it is neatly divided into four parts or acts 10k-20k that will be the eventual Lit submissions). That got me thinking that I don't really have a conscious policy for when to use and when not to use actual chapters, and I started to think about it. I came up with - they're largely unnecessary for anything under 10k words, are more important when you have PoV shifts but I'm not sure if a clean scene break accomplishes the same thing (~ ~ ~ ~ ~).

I'm sure there's a bit more to it than that. How does everyone approach this?

 

[IWroteThis]

Well, first, I don't use chapters for scenes. I use chapters to group scenes when those groups of scenes have a natural separation. Likewise, the length of chapters is based on the length of the included scenes, not some arbitrary number I set. I have one story I'm writing where each chapter is longer than another story that is three chapters long. Likewise, I have some unchaptered stories that are longer than others with chapters. Again, it's not about length, although I do think longer stories need chapters for easier reading. It's primarily about what best serves the story I'm telling.

 

[ElectricBlue]

they're largely unnecessary for anything under 10k words, are more important when you have PoV shifts but I'm not sure if a clean scene break accomplishes the same thing (~ ~ ~ ~ ~).

Perfectly adequate, within a longer chapter.

I'm sure there's a bit more to it than that. How does everyone approach this?

Do what suits the story, but remember, if you're publishing separate chapter submissions on Lit, number them 01, 02, 03, or the auto-numbering algorithm will go belly up when you get to Ch.10. if, for whatever reason you plan more than 99 chapters (please don't), then 001, 002, 003 etc.

 

[Voboy]

I use chapters sometimes, not often. I do it when it feels right for the story, typically in historical or fantasy settings. I guess I seek an "old-timey" feel when I do it.

I often do the little three-asterisk page break, but I don't really think of those as chapters.

ETA: I'm talking about "chapter" divisions within one submission, not divisions over a string of stories submitted separately.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Do what suits the story, but remember, if you're publishing separate chapter submissions on Lit, number them 01, 02, 03, or the auto-numbering algorithm will go belly up when you get to Ch.10. if, for whatever reason you plan more than 99 chapters (please don't), then 001, 002, 003 etc.

I'm absolutely not talking about seperate chapter submissions because (as per typical AH advice and my own experience) a Lit submission is best at between 10k-20k words and a chapter is typically 2-6k words. They're not the same thing, and, maybe because I focus on breaking stuff up into Lit submissions, I don't focus so much on literary chapters.

 

[old_prof]

I've been mostly publishing on another site this year, one that requires publishing a chapter as one piece. Chapters are concatenated in books and books can be part of a series, just to be clear. Their vision of chapters has definitely been impacting my writing. I had not used chapters at all until my first novel late last summer. I originally wrote it without chapters, then decided to break it into chapters. After that, everything longer than about 20K was split into chapters as I wrote it.

The other site pushes short-ish chapter (they think 1600-1800 words is the sweet spot). I somewhat ignore that guidance and write the length chapters that the story demands, but it has been gently pushing my chapters to be shorter. (The chapters in my original novel ranged from 5K-12K words.)

I keep saying this, but listen to the story. There is not an absolute correct chapter size. Go look at some of your favorite novels. The chapters in there probably vary in length pretty substantially.

One last question is chapter titles or not? I like chapter titles, but I kind of like coming up with titles. I know many stories, here and on the sites and in "serious" literature don't use titles.