I published over 400 stories last year. The punchline is that they all averaged 22 words or less. These stories were published on Thaumatrope, the first twitter fiction magazine, and became part of the microfiction revolution and the recent trend of twitter fiction. Yes, they were all stories that were written in 140 characters or less.
In my comings and goings, introducing people to the twitter fiction concept, I’ve often heard it asked: “How is it possible to write a story that short? If a story must contain an entire plot then how can you compress all that into just a few sentences?” My answer: “Can you tell a joke?”
But seriously folks, try writing your twitter fiction in the form of a joke. Not that it needs to be funny, but that it should have a set-up (exposition, in literary terms) and a punchline (a climax and/or resolution). Consider the work of famous short-form comedian Henny Youngman:
A doctor has a stethoscope up to a man’s chest. The man asks, “Doc, how do I stand?” The doctor says, “That’s what puzzles me!”
In under 140 characters you have a complete story—the set-up: A doctor has a stethoscope up to a man’s chest. The man asks, “Doc, how do I stand?” and the punchline: The doctor says, “That’s what puzzles me!”
Even Ernest Hemingway’s six-word story contains the same elements: the exposition: For sale: Baby’s shoes, and the climax/resolution: Never worn.
Here are some examples of twitter fiction stories originally appearing on Thaumatrope that follow the same pattern:
“The truth,” I said, “is out there.” In a bus station locker in Trenton, NJ, seething, breathing, waiting, explosive. “I have the key.”
“Your first edition of Twilight gave me a paper cut!”
“Yeah, it does that to everyone sooner or later.”
If a Chronodoc says not to let paradox worry you because the math is all right this time, punch him. Punch him while you still have fists.
But the set-up/punchline format isn’t the only one that you could use. You can be even more direct. Henny Youngman was famous for his one-liners:
My doctor grabbed me by the wallet and said, “Cough!”
The one-liner concept, a story that can be told without pause all in one breath, is a bit more difficult to write. It requires that the exposition, climax, and resolution be all in one sentence. Here are some twitter fiction stories using the one-liner concept:
Lying in drag, waiting for the little girl, the wolf wonders what his own grandmother would say about how his life has turned out.
Sadly, Lillie realized the full scope of her powers the day she wished her math teacher would be hit by an asteroid the size of the moon.
The joke is just one of many forms that twitter fiction could take. Take a moment to browse the Thaumatrope archives, and see if you can recognize the format in the stories there. Hopefully this serves as an starting point for writers who want to write stories in the twitter fiction and the other microfiction forms.
I’ve got a million of ‘em, folks.
This is precisely the kind of approach I took in writing Twitter fiction, using the one-liner as a thematic model. Few people appreciate how hard one-liners are, until they try to write a few really good ones.
A proper joke is a story, after all. I always get annoyed when a rejection claims a flash or super-short is a joke instead of a story; those jokes were stories where the aim was humor. The model of the one-liner is even harder than the basic plot delivery model of the joke; even some of the tweet tales I’ve published with Thaumatrope were technically two-liners.
[...] Twitter magazine Thaumatrope, just posted a great essay about the essence of lightning fiction:In my comings and goings, introducing people to the twitter fiction concept, I’ve often heard it a…I’ve always said the mark of a good storyteller is the ability to tell a joke. Why the heck do [...]
This is a great article — couldn’t agree more.
“You’ve got the eyes of a stranger,” he said.
“Yes,” she replied, “I got his wallet too!”
I think it’s really works when a twitter story is effective as both a joke and as a hint towards a larger narrative.
It’s tiring when people say, “You can’t call that a story” (friends, family, writing group). Some say it’s only a fad in today’s information overloaded society, but clearly Hemingway would have disagreed.
A great article. Never heard of twitter fiction before though I’ve used Twitter for quite some while.
I completely disagree with those who’d say “This is not really a story.” The twittories (or twittales?) should, if sustained as a genre, represent a new spin off on the older-living small form in fiction, be it poetry or prose, IMHO.
There was a British adage, probably outdated now, especially looking at the likes of Sascha Baron Coen, ‘A gentleman should be able to say so little — but to mean so much!’
[...] go even more minimal with Twitter’s 140 character limit. A lot of the pieces employ the joke format while others play with the negative space of what is unsaid. I’ve found that writing [...]
[...] but it is possible to hint at a larger story or to deliver a complete piece with punchline. Nathan E. Lilly explains the concept quite well, I think, by comparing Twitter fiction to jokes with a set-up, a [...]
[...] worth checking out if you’re interested in pursuing micro-fic writing. Another good post is Twitter Fiction is a Joke, by Nathan E. Lilly, which covers some of the micro-fic formats and offers [...]
[...] your story like a joke is highly effective: a quick set-up followed by a twisted [...]
[...] as jokes or literally are jokes (the editor of the now defunct Twitter zine Thaumatrope has a post about this). I like straight up funny fiction, but my preference is for the pieces that use a joke-like [...]
[...] fiction by the editor of Trapeze Magazine, Jessica Otto: Why Twitter Fiction? Another good post is Twitter Fiction is a Joke by Nathan E. Lilly, which covers some of the different formats. Well worth checking out if you’re [...]
[...] your story like a joke is highly effective: a quick set-up followed by a twisted [...]