One of my favorite passages in Cormac McCarthy’s All The Pretty Horses comes about three quarters of the way through…
The hero has been through hell and he’s about to find out if it was all worth it. In some sense everything in the book has been pointing to what is about to happen.
All this intensity has built up…
…and then he’s forced to wait.
If I remember right, he’s literally waiting for a train.
So he has to pause, and we pause with him. He sits with some children and one thing leads to another and he begins to recount to the children what has happened to him so far.
Which is the story we’ve just read.
He tells an abbreviated version in his own words while the children listen.
And then it’s on to the climax.
You see scenes like this from time to time. There’s one in Return of the Jedi for instance.
When C3PO tells the story of the trilogy to the Ewoks before the climactic battle.
And I know I’ve seen it a few other times but I can’t think of an example.
Henry IV Part 2 maybe?
I guess these things are when:
1. A character retells the story so far.
2. During a quiet before the storm.
3. To an outsider/innocent audience.
I always love these. They’re like a deep breath.
So here’s my question:
❓Do these things have a name?
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This post is archived from my account on li.st, a social media app that shut down in 2017. Some posts have been edited slightly to fix typographical errors and correctly represent the gender of some individuals. You can view the full archive here.