Books I Abandoned Enjoying Are Accumulating by My Bed. What If That's a Positive Sign?
It's a bit awkward to reveal, but let me explain. Several titles wait by my bed, each only partly read. On my smartphone, I'm midway through 36 audiobooks, which looks minor alongside the forty-six Kindle titles I've abandoned on my e-reader. This doesn't include the expanding pile of advance copies next to my living room table, competing for endorsements, now that I work as a professional novelist personally.
Starting with Persistent Reading to Deliberate Setting Aside
On the surface, these stats might appear to corroborate recent thoughts about current focus. One novelist noted recently how easy it is to lose a person's focus when it is divided by online networks and the 24-hour news. The author remarked: “It could be as readers' attention spans evolve the fiction will have to adapt with them.” Yet as a person who used to persistently complete every book I started, I now regard it a personal freedom to stop reading a story that I'm not connecting with.
Life's Limited Duration and the Glut of Options
I don't believe that this practice is caused by a short attention span – instead it comes from the feeling of existence passing quickly. I've consistently been struck by the spiritual principle: “Keep death every day before your eyes.” One point that we each have a only finite period on this world was as sobering to me as to everyone. However at what other moment in our past have we ever had such immediate access to so many mind-blowing works of art, whenever we desire? A surplus of treasures meets me in each bookshop and within every device, and I want to be deliberate about where I focus my attention. Might “not finishing” a novel (shorthand in the literary community for Did Not Finish) be not just a sign of a limited focus, but a selective one?
Reading for Understanding and Self-awareness
Particularly at a period when the industry (and thus, selection) is still led by a specific group and its issues. Although engaging with about individuals distinct from our own lives can help to strengthen the ability for compassion, we furthermore read to think about our own lives and role in the society. Until the works on the racks more fully reflect the identities, lives and concerns of potential readers, it might be quite difficult to hold their interest.
Contemporary Storytelling and Consumer Engagement
Of course, some authors are effectively creating for the “today's attention span”: the tweet-length writing of certain current works, the tight fragments of different authors, and the brief chapters of several contemporary titles are all a excellent showcase for a briefer style and method. Additionally there is no shortage of author advice designed for securing a consumer: hone that opening line, enhance that opening chapter, raise the tension (more! more!) and, if writing crime, place a dead body on the opening. That suggestions is completely sound – a prospective representative, editor or reader will spend only a few precious minutes determining whether or not to proceed. It is no point in being difficult, like the individual on a writing course I participated in who, when challenged about the storyline of their novel, stated that “everything makes sense about three-fourths of the into the story”. No novelist should subject their reader through a set of challenges in order to be comprehended.
Crafting to Be Understood and Giving Patience
And I do create to be understood, as much as that is possible. At times that needs guiding the reader's attention, steering them through the story point by succinct beat. At other times, I've discovered, insight requires time – and I must grant my own self (along with other writers) the grace of meandering, of adding depth, of deviating, until I find something meaningful. An influential thinker contends for the story finding new forms and that, as opposed to the standard narrative arc, “other forms might help us envision novel ways to create our narratives vital and real, keep creating our books fresh”.
Change of the Story and Modern Mediums
Accordingly, both opinions converge – the story may have to adapt to accommodate the today's consumer, as it has repeatedly accomplished since it first emerged in the historical period (as we know it today). Perhaps, like past authors, tomorrow's writers will return to serialising their novels in periodicals. The future those creators may even now be publishing their work, section by section, on online platforms including those visited by millions of regular visitors. Creative mediums change with the times and we should permit them.
Beyond Short Focus
However let us not claim that all shifts are completely because of limited focus. Were that true, concise narrative compilations and very short stories would be regarded far more {commercial|profitable|marketable
