Chapter headings, French, late 1800's.
Dear Books,
I am thinking on chapters today. Why & where the break? How does a writer choose when to suggest, fairly strongly, that the reader stop there, for a half page of empty or a month of dust gathering?
I know the rule for the paragraph; put is where you change topic. But that, that is a matter for debate: if I fret over it too long, I don't string sentences at all. I start mulling and stop writing. But, again, those are the same, or at least, writing and mulling don't call for a paragraph change.
Mostly, as I was educated on the feral side of civilization (yes! a true cave, with an actual dingo for a dad and wolf for a mother- should this go in a different paragraph?), mostly I try to keep the stripes of text and space looking nice- oh, and to have three of course is nice- having three, or five, makes my writing seem learned, proper. One definitely wants something to seem proper, especially when it isn't, or there is doubt about it.
And so the chapter continues to mystify. Maybe there is a class or course I never got to; a class beyond the paragraph rules, a course that defines the preferred form for chapter breaks?
PS
Well, yes, I know, this PS could make the fifth, and I could look it up, and you know, I tried to; very feebly, in the way that a mountainous surfeit of a thing (information) makes a person not really want it. I clicked on a link to an essay on the history of the chapter and it had a paywall, and well, there we go then, choosing to frugally stay in ignorance, but more than just that, also to in this case stay in wonder, to stay in further contemplation of the chapter instead of seek a Definitive Answer. As Violette LeDuc's Lady and the Little Fox Fur says "...after all, ignorance was also a perpetual promise."
