I think the word you're going for is "moot," not "mute." But it isn't a moot point.
Effects that don't work do not work for a specific reason: They fail to elicit a response in a reader.
Any time you try something funky, nonstandard and unfamiliar, you will cause a reader to pause and blink, wondering what to make of this weird thing. Confusion is a response, yes, and so is curiousity, but if the reader is baffled, they won't bother reading further.
Varying your line lengths back and forth sounds like a reasonable strategy, but if you go too short or too long, it'll become difficult and unpleasant to read and most readers won't bother.
I won't say "No, you can't do that," but there are certainly other less risky strategies you could use to engage the reader, or to indicate pauses and timing. Regular commas, dashes, periods and so forth all are designed to let the reader know when to take a breath and for how long. To basically use line breaks in place of commas and periods seems pointless. Or pretentious.
Here's the above paragraph with the commas as line breaks and the periods as stanza breaks, and everything lowercased e.e. cummings style:
i won't say "no
you can't do that"
but there are certainly other less risky strategies you could use to engage the reader
or to indicate pauses and timing.
regular commas
dashes
periods and so forth all are designed to let the reader know when to take a breath and for how long
to basically use line breaks in place of commas and periods seems pointless
or pretentious
Kevin
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