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THE ART OF SOUND PICTURES
relate the horrors and hazards endured by the characters in some strange situation. Thus, you might write an excellent story about Commander Byrd and how some members of his party experienced Antarctic blizzards, all without concealing the final disaster or triumph of the party.
The Four Varieties of Suspense
There are, all told, just four kinds of suspense, two of them serviceable, and two of them destructive. Here they are, reduced to their lowest terms.
Two varieties of suspense are good:
1. Suspense which develops as a matter of fact in the events of the story. This we find in any ordinary mystery, such as the finding of the body of an unknown man propped up in the chair at the head of the dining table in the White House some morning.
2. Suspense which does not develop in the events themselves, as they happen, but is invented by the story-teller in order to whet the spectator’s curiosity and excitement.
Two kinds of suspense are wrong:
1. Suspense resulting from the story-teller’s failure to make clear a character or a situation.
2. Suspense which results from the writer’s diverting the spectator to minor aspects of the main story, thereby leaving problems or mysteries unsolved.
The first of these four varieties appears in The Canary Murder Case. The body of a notorious dancing girl is found, strangely slain, in her own apartment. Many people are suspected of the murder. The suspense throughout the story is developed, more or less logically, around the progressive involvement of these people, right up to the identification of the criminal.