Speechwriting: The Magic of the One-Sentence Paragraph

One-sen­tence para­graphs are com­mon when short pieces of di­a­log are being ex­changed, but con­sider the ef­fect of se­r­ial one-sen­tence para­graphs in other con­texts. The fol­low­ing ex­cerpt from my sailing memoir, The Blue Monk de­scribes an ocean cross­ing in a small wooden boat:

The sun marches over our heads through a field of blue, burns the horizon beyond our wake, yields to the stars, purples the east, and rises before us again

We are aground in a river of time.

We eat.

We sleep.

With the wheel, we turn the ocean round our boat.

Days pass like silken threads on hidden currents of wind.

Hours hover like dust revealed by a sunbeam.

Forever collapses into a moment.

There can be no other side, no destination.

There is only here, only now.

The wind falls light again.

We motor over calm, shimmering seas.

The nar­ra­tive re­flects on the pas­sage of time at sea. Though it could have been writ­ten as a sin­gle para­graph, con­sider how iso­lat­ing each thought af­fects the pac­ing.

This is a mar­riage of prose and po­etry de­signed to be “read aloud” in your head.

Pause at each comma.

Stop at the end of each sen­tence.

Let the words ring.

Short, sin­gle-line para­graphs mimic the ex­pe­ri­enc­ing mind. Ex­pe­ri­ence, in its pure form, tran­scends words. More words could con­vey the au­thor’s pic­ture of an ex­pe­ri­ence at the ex­pense of the reader’s. Why place your reader in your head when you can pull them into your scene?

Write suc­cinctly and se­ri­ously.

One-sen­tence para­graphs cue your reader to stop and re­flect.

As they say, “the devil is in the de­tails.”

So get rid of the de­tails.