ers, can be told as simply as the writer
desires. He has only to set down the succession of details that
constitutes the story. Each new incident will not only advance the
narrative progress of the story, but the commonplace nature of each
incident in itself will tend to give the fiction its necessary
plausibility. Simply because each incident is common and of universal
occurrence the reader will accept it and the story compounded of such
elements. Matter of fact phrasing, not phrasing too "literary" in spots,
is most suitable.[J] Such a story does not require high lights of
expression, and they should not be interpolated.

The story dealing with the strange and wonderful is another matter. In
writing it the author's aim is the same as in writing the commonplace
story, to give it plausibility and verisimilitude, but the task is
infinitely more difficult. Proper construction will aid greatly, and in
execution the writer has two resources.

The first is the method of Defoe, and consists in showing the reader the
strange course of events through a lattice of familiar thoughts and
things. It is an attempt to give the essentially bizarre story something
of the plausibility and power of the story of the commonplace by
interpolating universally familiar matters of detail. They are
unnecessary to the bare story, but they are useful to give the reader a
thread of connection between his own experience and the strange fiction.
The method is persuasive, and requires a high degree of craftsmanship to
employ well. Familiar and unfamiliar must be woven together with a
careful and skilful hand. And obviously it requires space. Examples are
Defoe's work--often cited--such as "Robinson Crusoe" or "A Journal of
the Plague Year," or Balzac's "Peau de Chagrin."

The second method to give to the strange and wonderful verisimilitude
and plausibility is not persuasive, but consists in writing with such
vividness, definition, and force that the verbal picture will be
accepted without question as visual evidence. Seeing is believing. In
fact, the more strange or wild any chain of events, the deeper their
impression on a reader, provided always that he be made to see them.
Obviously, to the use of this method the highest powers are necessary,
the power to select the salient and distinctive points of the thing to
be drawn, excising all superfluous matters, the power to choose the
exact and vivid word, and, finally, the power--more, seemingly, th