No, It Is Not Only Our Fate

Also, Perhaps Children Are Sterner Than Grown-up People In Their Refusal To Suffer, In Their Refusal, Even, To Feel At All.

What Is A Novel? I Say: An Invented Story. At The Same Time A Story Which, Though Invented Has The Power To Ring True. True To What? True To Life As The Reader Knows Life To Be Or, It May Be, Feels Life To Be. And I Mean The Adult, The Grown-up Reader. Such A Reader Has Outgrown Fairy Tales, And We Do Not Want The Fantastic And The Impossible. So I Say To You That A Novel Must Stand Up To The Adult Tests Of Reality.

What Must Novel Dialogue . . . Really Be And Do? It Must Be Pointed, Intentional, Relevant. It Must Crystallize Situation. It Must Express Character. It Must Advance Plot. During Dialogue, The Characters Confront One Another. The Confrontation Is In Itself An Occasion. Each One Of These Occasions, Throughout The Novel, Is Unique.

She Had One Of Those Charming Faces Which, According To The Angle From Which You See Them, Look Either Melancholy Or Impertinent. Her Eyes Were Grey; Her Trick Of Narrowing Them Made Her Seem To Reflect, The Greater Part Of The Time, In The Dusk Of Her Second Thoughts. With That Mood, That Touch Of Arriere Pensee, Went An Uncertain, Speaking Set Of Lips.

Good General-purpose Manners Nowadays May Be Said To Consist In Knowing How Much You Can Get Away With.