[ SECRET POST #5500 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5500 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 15 secrets from Secret Submission Post #787.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I never understand saying short fic is some kind of skill. I have only written short things (my longest is <7k, except for some drawer fics) because I never get ideas that can sustain themselves for very long. It's a failing, not something I do on purpose. People always seem to like longer fics.

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT Trust me, I ENVY writers who can write short fics. You get all the emotions and tension and, sometimes, even all the plot of a long fic, but in its most distilled and compact form.

I mean, check out this Doctor Who/Bojack Horseman crossover that's just gutpunch after gutpunch but also achingly hopeful (https://archiveofourown.org/works/21912310).

Or this Much Ado About Nothing fic that I personally consider a masterpiece (https://archiveofourown.org/works/19465297).

Or this Fleabag fic that's just,,, absolutely perfect, it's perfect, it works so well and is exactly what I think happened after s2 (https://archiveofourown.org/works/19041496)

And that's not even going INTO the number of absolute classics that also happen to be short stories, most of them under 10k. Asimov's "The Last Question", Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas", Stephen Leigh's "Encounter", Joyce's "The Dead" (seriously, read The Dubliners, that short story collection changed my life). And that's not even getting into authors whose BEST work is their short stuff: Flannery O'Connor, Phillip K. Dick, Ray Bradbury, Raymond Carver. Short stories are an ART, and fanfic short stories (drabbles, ficlets, oneshots, twoshots) can be just as great, if not more so, than longer fics.

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT Well ok, it can be done with skill, if that's what you set out to do. (I wasn't even thinking of professional writing!) "All I've got is this one small image that can't be stretched any further" feels like not the same thing.

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT Raymond Carver (one of my favs, I love his writing) does a lot with very compressed ideas and scenes and impressions. Take "Cathedral", his most anthologized work - if you look at the literal plot, it's just about a guy in an unhappy marriage who lets a homeless blind guy stay for the evening. The art is in the rest of it - all the thoughts and ideas and impressions this impulsive decision spark off, how the central character slowly changes from regretting his decision to having an almost religious experience, the power of art and architecture and, uh, weed apparently. It's masterfully done, and it's not too far off from something along the lines of "OTP fall asleep together after a long day" and other similarly sparse oneshots. It's about the feelings and emotions and impressions, and it can be done super well.