ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that in literary narratives, here particularly short stories, the 'right amount and right kind' of repetition is instrumental in the establishment of situation. It discusses the opening plot phase of a written story normally supply the reader with the materials with which to compose a Situation, and a mental picture. The picture theory of mental retention may also help explain why it is that default narrative preference is for the initial establishment of some extent of Situation. The context of literary writing and reading amounts to distinct circumstances, and several of the variabilities of language and communication are especially stabilised in the case of written narratives. Some work on narrative comprehension may give the impression that pronoun-interpretation is a paradigm case of what is involved in textual understanding. The reader comes to a novel or short story carrying certain kinds of expectation so general that they are almost above the level even of generic expectations.
