Little Question — Does Length Matter?

What do you think?

“length doesn’t matter in freewriting. when writing stories or something for hobbies/fun, length doesn’t matter. However, in official stuff, like essays for school, write the amount that you’re required or more..”

“Sometimes yes, sometimes no, length normally shows the amount of information that is in a piece of work.

“Sometimes, the longer the work, the more information that it holds

However, that does not mean it is better than anything else

If the legnth lacks quality, the writing piece will probably be overlooked”

“not necessarily…. Quality > Quantity

If a story is too long, the reader might get bored and not continue to read on….”

“For me, not really. I have seen chapters four pages long but are the most boring or retardest things I have ever read while I have chapters as short as prologues but with insight and excitement. “

” most likely longer compositions have more details and more interesting”

” Lengthy chapters are alright, but too long of a chapter gets boring after a while. You just really need to find a happy medium.”

” Yes but if its useless words and filler then don’t write about it. There are two types of introducing a story”

“Not all the time, honestly. Sometimes some of the greatest stories or poems are the shortest. It’s a lot about quality, but quantity does help sometimes.”

” No. Quality > quantity” (wow, second time I heard that today)

“no”

“well if its a novel you want it longer, and if its a haiku you want it shorter, but a longer piece of writing is not necesarily a better piece of writing.” So the length has to suit the purpose? “Sure”

What do I think? I think it’s absolutely the last thing you should ever care about, think about, or even consider.

Why? First of all, more text does not equal more information. And even if it did, that information wouldn’t be of any value. I could sit here and read a 400-page TV Guide and gain nothing. Why? I don’t watch TV.

Second of all, length just stretches out the same information over more words. If you want to make valuable stuff, write less so that you can apply more.

But when writing stories, there’s a bigger reason yet. If you’ve said everything you wanted to say, revised it enough and made it as good as you could, then it’ll automatically be beautiful, lengthy and deep.

That’s because if something is written in the best that it can be, then the amount of words, the style and the value will automatically correspond and what you wrote will be just as long as it has to be, and will be perfect as it is.

I’m going to steal something from the above and revise it. It’s not Quality > quantity, it’s Quality + Style + Revision = Exactly how much quantity is needed.

If you have any comments, responses for the survey or objections, let’s hear them.