ereby
emphasizing the existence and importance of the constructive phases of
technique. Briefly, it is that construction is at once easier and more
important to learn than execution. Perhaps a little argument in support
of the statement is called for.

It will not be questioned seriously that it is easier to learn the main
principles of construction than it is to learn or discover how to write
with finish and power. It is entirely possible to state abstractly the
principles of construction, to grasp their reasons and implications from
abstract statement, and to apply them by a mere act of the intelligence
in writing any story. But it is entirely impossible to state abstractly
the principles of writing with finish and power, or to learn to write so
from any mere discussion of the matter. The condition is illustrated by
almost any treatise on rhetoric, where half the text will be made up of
examples transcribed to lend some weight to the obviously--and
necessarily--inadequate discussion. How to write with finish and power
can be learned only by long continued and intelligent practice, if it
can be learned at all. Of course, this is not to say that constant
practice is not necessary to gain any real facility and adequacy in
applying the principles of construction.

The argument of the last paragraph is clinched by the fact that of a
thousand stories, all of which are well constructed and put together,
only a few or perhaps none will be written with any approach to real
literary power, in the verbal sense. Of all the writers of to-day who
can put together a story in workmanlike fashion how many have the power
of the telling word? how many have even a style?

I have yet to substantiate the assertion that construction is more
important for the writer of fiction to learn than execution, but the
task is easy. In the last analysis, the power of a story, that is, its
power to interest, depends upon its matter, the spectacle it presents.
If the whole conception is justly elaborated and properly put together,
it will have very nearly full effect, even though its writer does not
give it perfect verbal expression, provided the verbal precipitation of
the thing is not too shamelessly inadequate. Perfect verbal expression
is necessary to give a properly constructed story maximum effect; it is
not necessary to give it approximate effect. But perfect verbal
expression will not save a story that is misshapen and distorted through
lack