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CHAPTER LXI 303 tures will next assume, but it is to be presumed the action must be confined to one or at the most a very few settings and that the plays will be brief and largely interiors or painted exteriors. As on the dramatic stage dialogue must be natural and not stilted blank verse. Dialogue is no more than the natural speech of the persons. It must be characteristic and individual. The banker does not talk like the bully and the maid seldom has the vocabulary of her mistress. In timing dialogue it is well to remember that the players speak with a certain deliberation that makes for a slight delay and that the busi- ness will also require some of the allotted time as' a rule. Dialogue that may be read in four minutes may require five or six minutes to play. 5. It should be remembered that there is a form of drama in- tended to be read rather than acted, and that this reads more fluently than the spoken drama. Drama for the stage does not read as smoothly and may even sound disappointing to the novice who does not realize that inflection and gesture will be used to bring out the points. The action, too, will be less fully indicated, since in the reading play the action must be replaced by exact stage direction, where in stage plays only the essential business is generally indicated. 6. In writing dialogue and business, the former is written in black ink and the latter in red, if the machine has a two colored ribbon, otherwise the business is all underlined in red ink that it may be dis- tinguished from the speeches. In printing this underlined matter is set in italic type. There are two general forms of writing. One of these places the name of the character in the centre of the page. JOHN Can you see Harry coming yet? MARY (Crossing to zvindoiv) No. But here comes Jane, so it should not be long now before he comes. This is the form generally followed in manuscript plays, but it may be written, and generally is printed, in this form. JOHN—Can you see Harry coming yet? MARY (crossing to zvindozv) —No. But here comes Jane, so it should not be long now before he comes. In either form the speeches are printed single spaced. All the rest is double spacing. There are two spaces from the last speech and if the names are centered there is one white line between the name and the speech. Business to be played by a character who has no speech at the moment is written much as a speech would be, as— JOHN Enters through door, C. Stands zvatching Mary and Paul. Here "C" means the centre of the stage. The right hand (or Prompt) is the right as the player faces the audience and the reverse the left, or OP (opposite). The author is supposed to indicate the general