Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

60%
+1 −0
Q&A Does symbolism have only one level of depth?

Yes, this is possible. It's called deeply nested fiction (and happens to be a particular interest of mine!). Many of the great classic works of world literature, such as the Arabian Nights, use t...

posted 6y ago by Chris Sunami‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T10:54:13Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/42345
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Chris Sunami‭ · 2019-12-08T10:54:13Z (almost 5 years ago)
Yes, **this is possible**. It's called deeply [nested fiction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Story_within_a_story) (and happens to be a [particular interest of mine](https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-689-83399-1)!). Many of the great classic works of world literature, such as the _Arabian Nights_, use this pattern. It's likewise common in [modern metafiction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction).

In general, in my experience, the more deeply you nest your fiction, **the simpler, the less realist, the more archetypal and the more symbolic the deeper levels become**. So there's an effective limit to how many levels you can reasonably have.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2019-02-19T19:15:51Z (almost 6 years ago)
Original score: 4