Everything is instant these days. We can do our shopping and banking without leaving our homes. We don’t even have to cook any more. We can buy prepared meals to zap in the microwave or get fast food at the drive-through.

Even our entertainments have changed. Movies are an explosion of fast action and eye candy. And our books. They’re fast too. Writers have to keep up with our need for instant gratification.

As I began to formulate this particular rant into an organized speech for my Toastmasters club, I thought some comparisons would be fun. I got to thinking that some of my favorite classics would never be published today. In this society in which instant gratification is expected from everything, fiction doesn’t make it out of the slush pile to the editor’s desk if it doesn’t grab the reader in the first page—and preferably the first sentence or paragraph. Wordy prose is as dead as those classic authors.

Case in point. Here’s the third paragraph of the second chapter of Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy. I should first mention that the beginning of the first chapter takes five pages to describe Egdon Heath.

“The old man frequently stretched his eyes ahead to gaze over the tract that he had yet to traverse. At length he discerned, a long distance in front of him, a moving spot, which appeared to be a vehicle, and it proved to be going the same way as that in which he himself was journeying. It was the single atom of life that the scene contained, and it only served to render the general loneliness more evident. Its rate of advance was slow, and the old man gained upon it sensibly.”

Here’s another great example (from the House of Seven Gables by Nathanial Hawthorne):

“One inauspicious circumstance there was, which awakened a hardly concealed displeasure in the breasts of a few of the more punctilious visitors. The founder of this stately mansion—a gentleman noted for the square and ponderous courtesy of his demeanor—ought surely to have stood in his own hall, and to have offered the first welcome to so many eminent personages as here presented themselves in honor of his solemn festival. He was as yet invisible; the most favored of the guests had not beheld him. This sluggishness on Colonel Pyncheon’s part became still more unaccountable, when the second dignitary of the province made his appearance, and found no more ceremonious a reception. The lieutenant-governor, although his visit was one of the anticipated glories of the day, had alighted from his horse, and assisted his lady from her side-saddle, and crossed the Colonel’s threshold, without other greeting than that of the principal domestic.”

If Nathanial Hawthorne had to break into the market today, he might have had to write the above paragraph more like this:
Colonel Pyncheon’s peers and betters barely concealed their dismay at his consistent and sullen refusal to greet them.

Did I leave out anything? Did you miss his eloquent version? Some might but it’s just the way things are. So long as most people want fast fiction, that’s the only thing that will get published.

Here’s an example of contemporary fiction from one of my favorite authors, Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card, pg 1:

“I’ve watched through his eyes, I’ve listened through his ears, and I tell you he’s the one. Or at least as close as we’re going to get.”

“That’s what you said about the brother”

“The Brother tested out impossible. For other reasons. Nothing to do with his ability.”

“Same with the sister. And there are doubts about him. He’s too malleable. Too willing to submerge himself in someone else’s will.”

“Not if the other person is his enemy.”

“So what do we do? Surround him with enemies all the time?”

“If we have to.”

“I thought you said you said you liked this kid.”

“If the buggers get him, they’ll make me look like his favorite uncle.”

“All right. We’re saving the world, after all. Take him.”

Are you hooked yet? We already know that this child they’re talking about is their best hope to save the world (and that the world is in grave peril).

The writer’s challenge now is not so much to wax eloquent as to quickly, yet gracefully, get to the point. It also doesn’t hurt to pack a punch. Remember that ill-fated advice: quality time is better than quantity time? Well, I don’t know how relationships survive without quantity but I know that to be successful in today’s market, our writing must take the reader somewhere “other” quickly and keep them there.

Copyright 2005 Ann Wilkes