4 ms·

What makes a great opening line? A great rest-of-the-story. Nobody praises the opening line of a story that they otherwise think is rather boring.

by dsr_ 5y ago

Timpy 5y ago
I don't know, I couldn't get through a chapter of Anna Karenina but it's still a great opening line. “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
- blowski 5y ago
  Keep going. It’s an amazing story.
  - dmje 5y ago
    Cor yeh, requires some staying power but what an amazing, life changing read.
    - jamiek88 5y ago
      I used to think ‘life changing read’ was hyperbole or just plain bullshit until I read Crime and Punishment. That masterpiece took me a long time to digest and did indeed change me.
      - belter 5y ago
        Ten years of exile in Siberia, is the requirement to write at that level.
- lelandfe 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina_principle
mattmanser 5y ago
The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed Stephen King has written about how the Dark Tower was written, and it came from the opening line. A great opening line is an inspiration for the rest of the story, it sets the scene.
- Anthony-G 5y ago
  I loved the first three books when I read them back in the early nineties but The Gunslinger is my favourite of the series. It had a certain poetic beauty and mysterious quality to it that was unlike any other Stephen King book that I had read before – or since.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ghaff 5y ago
I'm not sure that's true. Certainly there are a number of "classics," including some like A Tale of Two Cities that are probably not the author's best work, which most people would probably find boring with memorable openings.
Joeboy 5y ago
LIFE IN this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to women, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and destroy the male sex. Valerie Solanas' The SCUM Manifesto has a great opening, and tbf sustains the pace and spice for a few pages, but subsequently becomes almost unreadable.
andrewflnr 5y ago
Some of us do. But more often we mourn them as a disappointment.
0xcde4c3db 5y ago
How many examples of a great opening line with a dismal rest-of-the-story do you have? To me, the great opening line is a microcosm of the great story: the tension between setup and punchline, between conflict and resolution, between mystery and revelation, and so on. The alchemy of storytelling is for an author to maintain that seemingly gravitational pull of the audience being inexorably hungry for the next answer without ever making it feel cheap. By extension, the ideal master of the craft can crystalize that dynamic at precisely the points that matter, and thereby make a space to play with such luxuries as theme and characterization and metaphor and parable in the rest.
- SamBam 5y ago
  While I'm sure that one could find plenty of counter-examples if they tried, I did indeed flip through my (quite few) two-starred books on GoodReads, read their opening sentences, and found that each one was a clunker. So I think you make a good point. Actually, I wonder if I could accurately guess my own ratings by how much I liked the first line.
D-Coder 5y ago
"It was a dark and stormy night." A perfect opening line. Followed by a long paragraph beating the same topic to death. And who remembers the rest-of-the-story.
- jfk13 5y ago
  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/654419.It_Was_a_Dark_and_Stormy_Night https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/654419.It_Was_a_Dark_and... Unforgettable, brilliant. (Find the original large-format hardback, not the paperback re-issue that can't possibly recapture the exuberant pictures spread across the pages.) (I guess you may have been thinking of a different book...?)
  - Narretz 5y ago
    He's talking about the opening of Paul Clifford by Edward Bulwer-Lytton: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/12/the-opening-sentences-of-paul-clifford.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/12/th... The opening line and following run-on sentence has acquired a bit of a cult following and inspired a contest for best worst fictional opening: https://www.bulwer-lytton.com/ https://www.bulwer-lytton.com/ It's possible the author you linked was inspired by this as well.
    - jfk13 5y ago
      > It's possible the author you linked was inspired by this as well. More than possible; I'm pretty sure it's deliberate. They like to take well-known, even clichéd, elements and re-imagine them in new and creative ways.

What makes a great opening line? A great rest-of-the-story. Nobody praises the opening line of a story that they otherwise think is rather boring.

by dsr_ 5y ago

What makes a great opening line? A great rest-of-the-story. Nobody praises the opening line of a story that they otherwise think is rather boring.

Timpy 5y ago

I don't know, I couldn't get through a chapter of Anna Karenina but it's still a great opening line. “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

blowski 5y ago
Keep going. It’s an amazing story.
- dmje 5y ago
  Cor yeh, requires some staying power but what an amazing, life changing read.
  - jamiek88 5y ago
    I used to think ‘life changing read’ was hyperbole or just plain bullshit until I read Crime and Punishment. That masterpiece took me a long time to digest and did indeed change me.
    - belter 5y ago
      Ten years of exile in Siberia, is the requirement to write at that level.
lelandfe 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina_principle

mattmanser 5y ago

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed Stephen King has written about how the Dark Tower was written, and it came from the opening line. A great opening line is an inspiration for the rest of the story, it sets the scene.

Anthony-G 5y ago
I loved the first three books when I read them back in the early nineties but The Gunslinger is my favourite of the series. It had a certain poetic beauty and mysterious quality to it that was unlike any other Stephen King book that I had read before – or since.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

ghaff 5y ago

I'm not sure that's true. Certainly there are a number of "classics," including some like A Tale of Two Cities that are probably not the author's best work, which most people would probably find boring with memorable openings.

Joeboy 5y ago

LIFE IN this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to women, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and destroy the male sex. Valerie Solanas' The SCUM Manifesto has a great opening, and tbf sustains the pace and spice for a few pages, but subsequently becomes almost unreadable.

andrewflnr 5y ago

Some of us do. But more often we mourn them as a disappointment.

0xcde4c3db 5y ago

How many examples of a great opening line with a dismal rest-of-the-story do you have? To me, the great opening line is a microcosm of the great story: the tension between setup and punchline, between conflict and resolution, between mystery and revelation, and so on. The alchemy of storytelling is for an author to maintain that seemingly gravitational pull of the audience being inexorably hungry for the next answer without ever making it feel cheap. By extension, the ideal master of the craft can crystalize that dynamic at precisely the points that matter, and thereby make a space to play with such luxuries as theme and characterization and metaphor and parable in the rest.

SamBam 5y ago
While I'm sure that one could find plenty of counter-examples if they tried, I did indeed flip through my (quite few) two-starred books on GoodReads, read their opening sentences, and found that each one was a clunker. So I think you make a good point. Actually, I wonder if I could accurately guess my own ratings by how much I liked the first line.

D-Coder 5y ago

"It was a dark and stormy night." A perfect opening line. Followed by a long paragraph beating the same topic to death. And who remembers the rest-of-the-story.

jfk13 5y ago
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/654419.It_Was_a_Dark_and_Stormy_Night https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/654419.It_Was_a_Dark_and... Unforgettable, brilliant. (Find the original large-format hardback, not the paperback re-issue that can't possibly recapture the exuberant pictures spread across the pages.) (I guess you may have been thinking of a different book...?)
- Narretz 5y ago
  He's talking about the opening of Paul Clifford by Edward Bulwer-Lytton: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/12/the-opening-sentences-of-paul-clifford.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/12/th... The opening line and following run-on sentence has acquired a bit of a cult following and inspired a contest for best worst fictional opening: https://www.bulwer-lytton.com/ https://www.bulwer-lytton.com/ It's possible the author you linked was inspired by this as well.
  - jfk13 5y ago
    > It's possible the author you linked was inspired by this as well. More than possible; I'm pretty sure it's deliberate. They like to take well-known, even clichéd, elements and re-imagine them in new and creative ways.