Eleventh Sunday Salon 17.42.Reading like a Writer - Chapter 4: Paragraphs

Slow reading (which Francine Prose says is good) of the chapter on paragraphs. Paragraphs, by convention, should start with a 'topical' sentence, she says...then she proceeds to show why they often don't. As in all other aspects of writing (and the Arts in general, perhaps) there are no rules, and those that are there are quite often profitably broken.

Paragraphs are a feature which are individual to each writer, she says. Then goes on to give examples which indicate slight change of view-point, emphasis, time-frame, end with an action, start with an action and have an action half way through. It's exciting stuff and totally at odds with the advice meted out in a journalism course I did recently - which advised, quite simply, that paragraphs should be of approximately equal length!