Let's Drabble!

No, I did not misspell “dribble”. Nor am I inviting you to play a game of basketball with me! Don't be misled by the thumbnail picture of this write-up. If you’re curious about the literary context of this term, read on!

English literature does not have a very long history if you compare it with the time languages like French, Latin, Greek or Sanskrit have been around. It’s a baby in front of the over three thousand-years-old Sanskrit! All the same, the evolution it has seen is remarkable in its own way.
At first, poetry dominated the scene, then slowly but firmly drama established its own stage (pun intended!) and then came the turn of the humble essay, diary and letter-writing formats of fiction. At last, only about three hundred years ago, came the novel, without which today we can’t imagine the existence of literature in English. And to think that English as a separate language took shape in just the last seven hundred years or so.
This should make you wonder what changes it may have seen in recent years, in terms of format, since it is indeed a rapidly “developing” language.
One such new format that I’m going to talk about today is the “drabble”. You might have heard of flash fiction, stories under a thousand words or so, or micro tales, short stories that are literally so short that they only span two or three sentences. Drabbles are also pieces of very short fiction, but somewhat in the middle—they are characterized by their exact length, i.e. hundred words. No more, no less.

Look at an example—and count for yourself if you wish!

“Unspoken words are usually better than words spoken in anger and yet, they lie awake at night, weeping, wanting to be set free. They are like flowers that will never open, denied of their moment of glory in the morning sun. They are the dusty manuscripts that never get read, let alone published. They can be the key to unlock the revolution that is going on inside your head. They can be your path to Eldorado. They can be simply ‘No,’ or ‘Stop’ or ‘I don’t think that’s a great idea, guys.’ If let fly, they might save someone’s life.” -Author Unknown.

Now you’re thinking, how could someone write a thought in specifically hundred words? Well, no one really does—but there sure are a few tricks to get it done.
First, decide the topic or idea. If you have something in mind already, great! Need inspiration? Try looking at a photograph, or a painting, or just a scene from your everyday life. Reflect on it, and then sit down to write. Even if only a line comes to you at first. Gradually, you’ll be able to expand the thought to some length, like one or half of a page.

Next, start cutting down on the length if it exceeds a hundred—look for unnecessary words or lines, and get rid of them. Now add or subtract a few words here and there to make it reach the required number. It all depends on your creativity—the kind of words you choose to replace others, the phrases you keep and the ones you let go.
Keep editing as much as you can, because the number of times you make a draft, the better it’ll come out at the end!
Here’s what I got when I tried my hand at it:

“All I want to do now is go back to my childhood; no, not the ‘sweet sixteen’ days but the ‘terrific ten’ days. All I wanted to do then was to grow up as fast as the groundnut seeds I’d sown in the spare pot on the balcony just a couple weeks before, and which had now become the home of a tender, young, green shoot. All I want to do now is to go back to water that little plant, which had shrivelled to death during the summer I went away with my family on our last vacation together.”

What do you think?
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