Autumn Arrives In The Early Morning.

Silences Have A Climax, When You Have Got To Speak.

Short Of A Small Range Of Physical Acts-a Fight, Murder, Lovemaking-dialogue Is The Most Vigorous And Visible Inter-action Of Which Characters In A Novel Are Capable. Speech Is What Characters Do To Each Other.

Dialogue Must Appear Realistic Without Being So. Actual Realism-the Lifting, As It Were, Of Passages From A Stenographer's Take-down Of A 'real Life' Conversation-would Be Disruptive. Of What? Of The Illusion Of The Novel. In 'real Life' Everything Is Diluted; In The Novel Everything Is Condensed.

One Should Discuss One's Difficulties Only When They Are Over.

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.