Category Archives: Once upon a time

Starting a work of fiction with “Once upon a time” has advantages, especially for children:

• It gets them going, and getting going can be hard.
• It decides the verb tense—the past tense—saving them time.
• It decides the point of view—third person omniscient almost always—again, saving time.
• Either it tells readers that knowing the exact time isn’t important or it gives writers time to consider the setting while they write.
• It tells readers that the story which follows is a fairy tale, so expect  magic.

But usually—maybe always—“Once upon a time” isn’t needed.  When my students revise, I tell them to eliminate “Once upon a time” and start with what follows, like this:  “Once upon a time, a girl named Cindy dreamed to open her own bakery.”  I explain that “Once upon a time” is a crutch, and since they have moved along in their story, or perhaps even finished it, they don’t need the crutch any more. Deleting “Once upon a time” is usually the right thing to do.

“Once upon a time” has been used to start European fairy tales and folk tales for at least six hundred years.* At first it was used orally by story tellers.  Later it was kept by Hans Christian Andersen, the Brothers Grimm and other writers when they wrote down the stories.

A similar opening crutch is “One day.”  “One day” tells us the exact day isn’t important, or at least not important at the beginning of the story.  That day might turn out to be important later on, but for the characters in the story and for us, the readers, that day was like any other when it started.

Is it wrong for student writers to rely on crutches like “Once upon a time” or “One day”?  Of course not.  These crutches get them writing that first sentence, often the hardest sentence of all.  Just remind them that later on they should delete that phrase unless what they write is truly a fairy tale.  Even then, ask if they want their readers to know from the start that they are reading a fairy tale.  If surprising readers is important, delete “Once upon a time.”  The story will be just as good—probably better.

*According to AI Overview in my Google search engine.