d
by the force of another and retain the advantages of both. It is
rather a complicated story, but the beginning is clear enough, and the
direction which it is to take is also clear. Everything in the novel,
not only the scenic episodes but all the rest, is to be in some sense
dramatized; that is where the argument tends. As for the beginning of
it, the first obvious step, the example of Thackeray is at hand and it
could not be bettered. I turn to Esmond.

IX

The novelist, I am supposing, is faced with a situation in his story
where for some good reason more is needed than the simple impression
which the reader might have formed for himself, had he been present
and using his eyes on the spot. It is a case for a general account of
many things; or it is a case for a certain view of the facts, based on
inner knowledge, to be presented to the reader. Thackeray, for
example, has to open his mind on the subject of Becky's ambitions or
Amelia's regrets; it would take too long, perhaps it would be
impossible, to set them acting their emotions in a form that would
tell the reader the whole tale; their creator must elucidate the
matter. He cannot forget, however, that this report of their emotions
is a subjective affair of his own; it relies upon his memory of
Becky's or Amelia's plight, his insight into the workings of their
thought, his sense of past action. All this is vivid enough to the
author, who has seen and known, but the reader stands at a further
remove.

It would be different if this consciousness of the past, the mind
which holds the memory, should itself become for the reader a directly
perceptible fact. The author must supply his view, but he might treat
his view as though it were in its turn a piece of action. It _is_ a
piece of action, or of activity, when he calls up these old
recollections; and why should not that effort be given the value of a
sort of drama on its own account? It would then be like a play within
a play; the outer framework at least--consisting of the reflective
mind--would be immediately in front of the reader; and its relation to
the thing framed, the projected vision, would explain itself. So long
as the recorder stands outside and away from his book, as Thackeray
stands outside Vanity Fair, a potential value is wasted; the activity
that is proceeding in his mind is not in itself an element in the
effect of the book, as it might be. And if it were thus drawn into the
book it wo