Please stop doing this one weird trick!

[conuly]

Yes, it's true that each time you switch speakers you start a new paragraph, but that does not mean that you stay in the old paragraph right up until the moment somebody else speaks.

As soon as the action switches from Alice to Bob, that's when you start the paragraph.



1. Alice shook her head. "I don't think that works, Bob." Bob turned around in confusion.

"Why not? It makes perfect sense to me!" Alice sighed as she struggled to explain.

"It just... doesn't!"

2. Alice shook her head. "I don't think that works, Bob."

Bob turned around in confusion. "Why not? It makes perfect sense to me!"

Alice sighed as she struggled to explain. "It just... doesn't!"

You see? One of these definitely flows better.

On an unrelated note, if somebody says they welcome otherwise unsolicited editorial corrections of spelling, grammar, general word choice, exactly how much should one take them at their word, and how many suggestions are too many?

Comments

[cactuswatcher]

I think this is a matter of style, and can't be written in stone. That said, I agree in principle, and that's the way I write my own things. But I've been translating somethings lately that have had many paragraphs of the following form which obviously was standard for a long time.

(From Tom Sawyer)
Tom's fearful secret and gnawing conscience disturbed his sleep for as much as a week and at breakfast one morning Sid said:

"Tom you pitch around and talk in your sleep so much that you keep me awake half the time."

Since I'm not trying to copy style 100% I'd usually break the paragraph then start a new paragraph with 'At breakfast one morning Sid said, "Tom...' But occasionally I leave the change of subject and colon and start the new paragraph with the quote. If the first paragraph has been changing subjects quickly, and the quote is something short like a non-pivotal 'yes' or 'no,' I might even put the quote in the first paragraph. It depends on the context.

[cimorene]

Although in your example, Sid's actions are part of the same sentence (and not in error; it's a natural sentence and in character), and the convention that you don't split mid-sentence has precedence.

But that aside, you could also argue that it was an example of knowing 'rule-breaking' on Twain's part. That rule often has to be negotiated with when the narrator voice is colloquial and naturalistic like this, since in speech it's common to join multiple people's actions and words in one sentence.

Of course that's part of why you said it's a matter of style - stylistic conventions are always a matter of context. But I do think it's a case of an exception that proves the rule, because that line break shows his awareness of it; and he is still evidently trying to facilitate reading comprehension.

Whereas passages like conuly's above, that go against convention by dividing the speaker from the dialogue repeatedly without any plausible reason, are probably the result of misunderstood stylistic guidelines and not deliberate authorial choices.

[conuly]

Moreover, Mark Twain was writing over 100 years ago. Conventions in orthography change over that time, just as they do in speech.