ABSTRACT

The form taken by a narrative is a way of thinking. This is true even if one can easily show that certain narrative procedures recur from one culture and historical period to another without any very evident signs of transformation, prompting theorists ancient and modern to feel justified in reducing narrative form to a set of fundamental, atemporal principles. Shifts in use, or in modes of description and prescription (poetics), may thus give us a particular insight into changing habits of thought in a given period and culture. One such shift is the development of a theory of suspense in the sixteenth century, together with corresponding developments in practice, even if the practice does not always map neatly on to the theory. Vida subsequently continues to explain his theory of narrative organization without using the word suspendere, but adding further metaphors and examples.