C.S.L. on dialogue

In correcting dialogue it is useful to imagine it being acted on the stage or at least read aloud. Is there anything which, before a large audience, you wd. feel embarrassed at – anything which an actor wd. find it difficult to say? It must always sound like real conversation but must be in reality clearer and more economical than that. Literature is an art of illusion.

—C. S. Lewis

(From a letter to Sister Penelope CSMV, 31 August 1948. Printed in The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, vol. 2.)

Comments

  1. how true!

  2. antares says

    Outstanding quote and spot on.

  3. “George, you can type this sh*t, but you sure can’t say it.” —Harrison Ford

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