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A lot of people find that they want to write a short story, even though they are not a "writer" or an "aspiring novelist." For many people, short story writing is relaxing - it is fun, therapeutic, and enjoyable. Writing short stories can be a great hobby, and can enable you to use your free time in a productive manner. At the same time, however, it is not much fun to write short stories if no one will read them! Kurt Vonnegut was one of the masters of modern American literature. For over fifty years - from the late 1940s to the mid-2000s - he wrote novels, essays, and short stories that were widely-read and highly acclaimed. Somewhere along the way, Vonnegut compiled his list of "rules" for writing short stories. The next few paragraphs summarize these ideas. Vonnegut began his rules focused on what you should do for the reader - firstly, that you should make sure the reader won't leave your story feeling like they wasted their time, and secondly that you should give the reader at least one character they can root for. Vonnegut continued with thoughts on characters after this, saying that every character should want something, even if it is as simple as a glass of milk, and that you should use every single sentence to either reveal something about the characters or to advance action. Vonnegut next implored writers to do the following: Make horrible things happen to your characters, even if they are kind and sweet. By doing this, you allow the reader to see what the characters are made of. He advises writers to start as close to the end as they possibly can, and to write to just please one person. To understand this last one, realize this: If you write to please one person, and that one person loves your story, then all others who have similar tastes to your "one person" will love it also. Vonnegut closes his rules by telling writers to give as much information as you can, as quickly as you can. "To heck with suspense," was his thought on this final rule. He claimed that the reader should always have a complete understanding of what is going on. In his notes on this list, Vonnegut also allowed that you can break every one of these rules and still write wonderful short stories. But you could sure do a lot worse than Kurt Vonnegut if you are going to find a writer to take advice from for writing short stories.
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