Senphalia: Gaia’s Academy-Prologue

This is a simple prologue that's not made to reveal too much in the story, if someone were to choose not to read it, it's designed not to affect the reader too much (my first try at a long story, comments greatly appreciated)

Senphalia: Gaia’s Academy
Prologue
When every person is but a child, they are often told that a story must have a beginning, a middle and an end. Yet if we each looked closer, we would realize that a beginning is simply the start of an end, and an end would be the start of a new beginning. The truth is, sometimes we just need to open up and see that circle, so that the middle can take on a new importance. I’m opening my eyes right now in fact, to tell my story. Only a section, a sliver in the passage of time, but one of the greatest middles in that neverending circle. EDIT: The bridge between a summer afternoon and new future.

A catchy little prologue. You probably could have just attached it to the first section though, it's so short.

I'm also a short story writer attempting a long story. If you could take the time to review my story [in my signature, or in the fantasy forum] that would be great! You've caught my interest, I'm excited to read Chapter One.

This is well written, there's nothing to really pick at here.

but...

"When every person is but a child"

You can easily use "When I was but a child" because you're using first person narration. The 'every person' may connect with the audience, but it's also a risk, because people might be 'huh?' about it. Either's good though.

Even though you don't want your prologue to be neccesary, it can have more ramification on your overall piece than mere philosophical insight. If you want people to critique your stuff I think it needs to be in that middling range between too short (this) and too long (novel sized chunks)

Cheerio,
Rubric

A good summary of one of those universal truths.

The change the pov needs to be tweaked, but that's easy enough. As a general rule, pov should be the same within a paragraph.

The second to the last sentence is a bit awkward. You could smooth it out perhaps with another comma or deleting the phrase "in fact" and by changing the tense of the word "tell"- the infinitve doesn't work well here.

I love the idea of ending with a fragment. It's great and sets up a reflective, omniscient mood.

Can't wait to see more- hopefully it'll be a bit longer.

I tell you something, if this was at the start of a book, I'd keep reading. Very true though, it IS the middle that counts... which is why it's clever, introducing you to the middle of a story at the very beginning...

First, I agree very much with the other comments!

Second, this could be longer. My prologue is short too, but this needs just a little bit more for it to really be a prologue.

Yet if we each looked closer, we would realize that a beginning is simply the start of an end, and an end would be the start of a new beginning

I would change this to something more like
Yet when I looked closer, I realized that a beginning could simply be the start of an end, and an end could be the start of a new beginning"

(I changed the POV and some wording)

The truth is, sometimes we just need to open up and see that circle, so that the middle can take on a new importance.

If I were you, I would clarify the underlined parts more. Open what up? And what circle?

I’m opening my eyes right now in fact, to tell my story. Only a section, a sliver in the passage of time, but one of the greatest middles in that neverending circle. The bridge between a summer afternoon and new future.

I would change the last line as it doesn't really fit quite right into the story. I'm not sure what....call me to brainstorm!!xxo