Short sentences and short paragraphs are usually an advantage in stories as well as in articles; they give crispness and brightness to the whole. Whereas long sentences and long paragraphs are both stodgy to read and uninteresting to look at, (and it must not be forgotten that the look of a page sometimes counts a good deal with the public).
I know that instances can be cited where celebrated people have written long sentences and ungainly paragraphs, and yet have been read. President Wilson, in his most famous Note to Germany, led off with a sentence of one hundred and seventy-one words, while there were only twelve full-stops in the whole message. But President Wilson, at that particular date, scored heavily over every other writer, in that the whole world was eagerly willing to read anything he wrote—even though he had omitted all stops and capital letters!—whereas the majority of us, alas, have to persuade or coax or beguile the public into looking at our words of wisdom, and we have to make the reading as easy for people as we can. Otherwise they will not bother their heads about us!
People were willing to put up with President Wilson's diffuse and "trailing" manner of writing, because at the moment he was the mouthpiece of the inhabitants of the United States. Any one who is the mouthpiece of over ninety millions of people can cease to worry about style—some one is sure to read him no matter how he expresses himself.
But so long as we manage to avoid having positions of such greatness thrust upon us, we shall do well to keep our sentences terse and short, and our MSS. broken up into paragraphs.
The Question of Polish
There is much divergence of opinion as to how far it is desirable to polish one's work. Personally I think it all depends upon the work.
Some authors put down their ideas in a very rough form, and seem unable to realise the possibilities of those ideas and their development, till they see them on paper.
Others are able to think in minute detail before they put a line on paper.
Some people can never leave anything alone, and will tinker with half a dozen fresh proofs (if they can induce the publisher to supply them). Others are more sure of themselves, or disinclined to alter what they have written.