Although we enjoy a good story, there has to be some point to it or it just disappoints. The problem with Shaggy Dog stories is that there isn’t any point, and that’s pretty much the definition. Many Shaggy Dog stories go on and on…full of irrelevant details that never add anything to the story, finally ending “Not with a bang but a whimper” or even worse, a poorly placed pun.
When you start writing a story, you have to at least have some kind of message in mind…otherwise, you’ll just wander around never getting anywhere, even if you’re a pantser. There’s a problem when you get to the end of your story and don’t even know it. How would you know the story is over if you don’t have some kind of goal or end in mind?
Stories exist because of the end…not the middle. Yes, they need the middle to build tension, aiming for the climax, which will reveal the final change, but it’s that change, that Transformation, that is the real essence of the story. That’s what the readers look for when they first pick up your book. Give them a good ending, and they’ll shout your praises far and wide.
Examples
There are many instances of Shaggy Dog stories, but two stand out as historical examples.
Mark Twain and Jim Blain
Mark Twain wrote about encountering a Shaggy Dog in Roughing It, a book covering his travels throughout the west. In chapter 53 he recounts meeting Jim Blain, who was apt to tell a story about his grandfather’s ram. Jim’s problem was that once he started off telling the story, he got side-tracked: first leading off into a tale about the family where his grandfather had acquired the ram, which then branched off into details about a man who, when he was thrown out of church, landed on an old lady with a glass eye. That is then followed by a long convoluted narrative about her glass eye…and her borrowing a wooden leg “because crutches were too slow.” A dozen or more barely linked stories later, over 1600 words, Jim suddenly falls asleep, never finishing the story about the ram.
It seems no one around had ever heard more than a brief mention of the ram at the beginning of the long account, but they all wanted Mark Twain to experience it for himself. Twain’s story ends with, “What the thing was that happened to him and his grandfather’s old ram is a dark mystery to this day, for nobody has ever yet found out.”
Nikolai Gogol and Captain Kopeikin
Another famous Shaggy Dog story appears in chapter 10 of Nikolai Gogol’s novel Dead Souls. As the characters attempt to identify the main character of the novel, Chichikov, someone misidentifies him as Captain Kopeikin. No one has heard of this Captain Kopeikin, so we get a story of almost 2000 words detailing all the adventures and goings on of Captain Kopeikin after the war. In the middle of the tale, someone interrupts, pointing out that Chichikov couldn’t be Captain Kopeikin. He reminds everyone that at the very beginning of the diversion, Captain Kopeikin is described as having lost an arm and a leg, and the mysterious Chichikov is whole. This makes the whole discussion of Captain Kopeikin null and void.
This Shaggy Dog story works well in this situation because the reader can sit back and laugh at the characters who spent all that time listening to a long involved story that turns out to be worthless. It also gives Nikolai a chance to develop some of the characters, allowing the reader to understand the general situation in that time and place.
Hidden Shaggy Dogs
Shaggy Dog stories are fine if they are in a story, intentionally put there by the author to create sympathy for the characters, explain the setting, or allow the narrator to poke fun at others. We only have a problem when the Shaggy Dog is the whole story…often not intended by the author.
Occasionally, we’ve seen a ms where the author didn’t have a clear vision of his story. He just wrote down whatever came next in his mind…barely linked ideas, similar to Jim Blain’s story. It’s difficult to critique or edit such a story, as often none of the Five Plot Points exist, there is no Logline to guide the flow, and no tension builds…just more and more extraneous details. In fact, many Shaggy Dog stories are identified by having an anti-climax, where the problems just go away—not necessarily with a Deus ex machina, but rather by coming up with a simplistic solution after all the anticipation.
Intentional Shaggy Dogs
Similar to Mark Twain’s friends who wanted to see him frustrated by Jim Blain’s story, if you are ever in our area, we’d like to introduce you to Roger. Known for stopping on the side of the road at public events to tell a story, he’ll draw a crowd. He then holds them entranced, blocking the pathway, for over twenty minutes as he goes on and on. Then he suddenly ends the story with a terrible pun, eliciting a groan from everyone expecting some big ending. We love to see how big of a crowd he can get…and how long he can keep them captivated…just so we can laugh at them.