How to read the opening of a novel

let the novel teach you how to read it

Brandon Taylor recently wrote about how to start a novel, his thoughts being inspired by the fact that many creative writing students are not well-read and need more and more guidance on the technical aspects of narrative. You should read his piece in full.

A few years ago, I ran a series of Interintellect salons called How to Read Fiction. We read six novels and used them as a way to learn some fundamental principles of understanding fiction. Persuasion, Silas Marner, A Room with a View, The Death of the Heart, The Remains of the Day, and The Gate of Angels. All great novels.

Here are some of the things we discussed.

• Why does Anne Eliot not get mentioned until the second or third page of Persuasion, and then only in passing? This is her novel, after all. All that time spent discussing Sir Walter and his lineage is not merely background information. As much as Persuasion is a romance, it is a romance about a changing society. It is a novel about consequence: both in the sense of social position and the results of our actions. For both reasons, Anne has been diminished at the start of the story.

• Silas Marner opens like a fairy tale. This is partly to emphasise that time moves faster in the age of technology and commerce, so even a story only one or two generations old has an old-world, fairy-tale feel, but also to emphasise the artificiality of the story itself. Eliot is trying to establish realism as a core principle. There are scenes in Silas Marner when you will feel like you are in the room with real people. That effect is enhanced by her plot, which has the feel of an “old tale”. Change the technology and the religion, she says, people are what they are.