conversation as we find it typically in everyday life, much of the
interest would leave the public utterance. Naturalness in public address
is something more than faithful reproduction of nature--it is the
reproduction of those _typical_ parts of nature's work which are truly
representative of the whole.

The realistic story-writer understands this in writing dialogue, and we
must take it into account in seeking for naturalness through change of
tempo.

Suppose you speak the first of the following sentences in a slow tempo,
the second quickly, observing how natural is the effect. Then speak both
with the same rapidity and note the difference.

I can't recall what I did with my knife. Oh, now I remember I
gave it to Mary.

We see here that a change of tempo often occurs in the same
sentence--for tempo applies not only to single words, groups of words,
and groups of sentences, but to the major parts of a public speech as
well.


QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES

1. In the following, speak the words "long, long while" very slowly; the
rest of the sentence is spoken in moderately rapid tempo.

When you and I behind the Veil are past,
Oh but the long, long while the world shall last,