Vignette (literature)

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The word vignette means "little vine" in French, and was derived from Old French vigne, meaning “vineyard”.[1] In English, the word was first documented in 1751, and was given the definition “decorative design".[1] This definition refers to decorative artwork of vine-leaves and tendrils used to embellish title pages and the commencement of chapters.[3] In 1853, the word was used to describe a popular 19th century photographic style, where portraits had blurred edges.[1] The definition of a vignette referring to a “literary sketch” was first recorded in 1880.[1] The idea of the "literary sketch" was derived from the sketch in visual arts - a rough or unfinished drawing or painting, showing the main elements of an artwork.[5] This reflects the characteristics of a vignette; brief and spontaneous, with a sense of immediacy.[6]

An example of a vignette used as a decorative artwork

In the 19th century, vignettes were found in newspapers and acted as brief and vivid descriptions of the news article’s subject, from the perspective of the writer.[7] According to Norman Sims (2007), these vignette sketches “provided writers with something we often miss today: the opportunity to write about ordinary life.”[7] These 19th century vignettes frequently offered few facts which could be verified, and tended to blend journalism with fiction.[7] These vignette sketches provided writers with a sense of imaginative freedom, and reflected the larger Victorian movement of integrating real life and art.[8] By blending fact and fiction, journalists could use their writing to explore their uncertainties and speculations about the subject.[7]

During the 19th century, vignettes were written by anonymous authors, and attributed to the newspaper or journal they featured in.[7] They were reused for new audiences and were therefore being constantly revised and re-contextualised.[7]

An example of a vignette photograph, with blurred and darkened edges

Later in the 19th century, vignettes in newspapers declined in use and popularity.[7] This was due to journalism becoming more realistic and fact based.[7] The decline of vignettes also reflected a broader shift in society towards scientific theories and realism.[9] Journalism and literature separated into different, distinct branches of writing, until literary journalism emerged in the late 19th century.[7]

The Streets, Morning, illustration by George Cruikshank for Sketches by Boz by Charles Dickens.

Aside from journalism, vignettes in the form of the “literary sketch” became popularised in the Victorian era by authors such as William Makepeace Thackeray and Charles Dickens, and their works would often appear in newspapers and magazines.[6] Works such as Sketches by Boz by Charles Dickens, and Thackeray’s Vanity Fair: Pen and Pencil Sketches of English Society, drew heavily from the original definition of a sketch in the visual arts by creating a sense of spontaneity, freedom and authenticity.[6] These sketches sometimes included visual illustrations by George Cruikshank, and were viewed as rough drafts rather than complete works of literature - a necessary step towards creating a finished work, but not inferior to a finished work.[6] The fragmentary and immediate style of these vignettes reflected the 19th century’s sense of economic and social instability, and the rapid pace of urban life.[6]

Dickens’ sketches often described brief and immediate scenes of everyday life.[6] The sketches represented a smaller part of a larger story and conveyed themes relevant to the Victorian Era such as social class, work and money.[6] The use of common themes across different vignettes provides each story with an additional dimension of depth.[10]

Due to the rise of post-modern and experimental literature after World War 2, attributes of vignettes resurfaced in popularity. Post-modern literature rejects the conventional “novel” structure and notions of a chronological plot and character development.[11] Techniques in postmodern literature such as minimalistic, “slice of life” stories and fragmentation became popular, which are also key characteristics of vignettes.[11] Vignettes also emerged in other forms of media such as postmodern theatre, which does not adhere to a fixed structure, style or genre.[4]

Vignettes are written in a brief, concise style. They are rich in imagery to create a vivid, detailed description of a moment in time and a character’s immediate experiences.[3]

While short stories and flash fiction are complete works that follow a narrative structure of beginning, middle and end, vignettes do not follow this traditional narrative structure.[12] A vignette contains less action and plot structure than flash fiction, and instead focuses on vividly capturing a single scene or a brief slice-of life moment in a character's experience.[2] Vignettes are short and tend to be under 1,000 words in length.[12] A vignette contains less action and drama than flash fiction, and places more emphasis on vividly capturing a single moment.[2]

As vignettes are often brief and do not allow for elaborate plot or character development, many writers craft vignettes to be part of a larger story or idea. For example, Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street is the length of a novel but is a collection of individual vignettes.[3] Each vignette explores common themes, motifs and characters that contribute to an overall plot.[3] In Ernest Hemingway’s collection of short stories In Our Time, individual vignettes integrate into an overarching narrative rather than acting as brief, isolated descriptions.[13] Charles Dickens’ collection of vignette sketches Sketches by Boz, although not contributing to a broader plot, explore common themes relevant to the Victorian era such as social class, adding a sense of depth and continuity.[6]

Vignettes also appear in other creative forms such as web series, television shows, and films. For example, the web series High Maintenance uses vignettes to explore the lives of a different set of characters in each episode.[14] This series uses the vignette style to vividly portray themes of the human condition, such as boredom and loneliness.[15] Movies and television shows also use vignettes to reveal more details about the inner world and past lives of characters.[12] The Netflix series Orange is the New Black uses flashbacks that act as vignettes to explore each character’s past in more vivid detail.[12] The 2018 Western anthology film The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is composed of six short films that act as vignettes.[16] In the 1989 romantic comedy When Harry Met Sally, director Rob Reiner weaves the fictional plotline with real-life vignettes of elderly, married couples telling the stories of how they met.[17]

Vignettes are also used in psychological research (see also: Vignette (psychology)).[18] In research, vignettes act as short descriptions about a hypothetical situation, to which survey participants respond with their perceptions, beliefs, attitudes, and how they would react to the given situation.[19] The wording of these vignette scenarios are experimentally controlled by the researcher, and different versions of the vignette may be randomly assigned to different participants.[20] These vignettes may be based on previous research findings, or based on real-life examples.[19] A potential limitation of using vignettes in psychological research is that individuals may respond differently to these fictional scenarios than their real-life response.[19] Vignettes can also be used to provide a fictional example of a psychological concept.[19] Vignettes have primarily been used by North American psychologists and in surveys.[19]

Writers of vignettes include Margaret Atwood, Alice Walker, Ernest Hemingway, Sandra Cisneros, William S. Burroughs, and Tim O'Brien.

Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood, 2015

Margaret Atwood is a Canadian writer whose works explore gender and identity.[21] Written as a series of seven short vignettes, Margaret Atwood’s The Female Body shows how perceptions of the female body differ between men and women. Only four pages in length, this series of vignettes highlights how the female body may be objectified.[12]

Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway's In Our Time

Ernest Hemingway is noted for his novels and short stories, and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954.[21] In Our Time is Hemingway’s collection of short stories. The collection features untitled vignettes, which are fragmented yet integrated into an overarching narrative. The vignettes act as critical aspects of the overall stories rather than inconsequential descriptions.[13] The writing style of In Our Time consists of succinct, declarative sentences characteristic of the Modernist period.[23] In Our Time explores World War 1 and its aftermath, depicting themes such as masculinity, adaptation, maturity and responsibility.[23]

• Sketch Story
• Flash fiction
• Vignette (psychology)
• Slice of Life
• Short Story
• Drabble
• Poetry
• Novel

• Hemingway, E. (1925). In Our Time . New York, United States: Boni & Liveright.
• Cisneros, S. (1984). The House on Mango Street. New York, United States: Arte Público Press.
• Burroughs, W. (1959). Naked Lunch. Paris, France: Olympia Press.
• O'Brien, T. (1990). The Things They Carried. Boston, United States: Houghton Mifflin.
• Cordell, R., et al. (2019). Classifying Vignettes, Modelling Hybridity. Minneapolis, USA: University of Minnesota Press.
• Armstrong, J. (2016). Gothic Matters of De-Composition: The Pastoral Dead in Contemporary American Fiction. Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture , (6), 127-143.
• Gildemeister, J. (1988) An American Vignette. United States, Bear Wallow Publishing Company.
• Pauly, T. (1975). The Literary Sketch in Nineteenth-Century America. Texas Studies in Literature and Language, 17(2), 489-503.
• Brogan, J. (1998). Hemingway's 'In Our Time': A Cubist Anatomy. The Hemingway Review, 17(2).
• Haydee, R. (2003). Breaking the Rules: Innovation and Narrative Strategies in Sandra Cisneros' the House on Mango Street and Ana Castillo's the Mixquiahuala Letters. Ethnic Studies Review, 26(1), 108-120.
• Wilson, M. (2012). Your Reputation Precedes You: A Reception Study of Naked Lunch. Journal of Modern Literature, 35(2), 98-125. doi:10.2979/jmodelite.35.2.98
• Chen, T. (1998). "Unraveling the Deeper Meaning": Exile and the Embodied Poetics of Displacement in Tim O'Brien's "The Things They Carried". Contemporary Literature, 39(1), 77-98. doi:10.2307/1208922