What an Interruption Does
IntroducedThree named effects
- Those structures can directly affect readers' experiences with a text by creating anticipation or suspense or building tension.
- Anticipation is knowing something is coming; suspense is not knowing how it ends.
- Building tension is a process rather than a state — it accumulates.
The writer knows what is behind the door; suspense lets the reader stand there with a hand on the knob.
Select all the effects the CED names for these structures.
All three are effects on the reader's experience of the text.
The effect is on the reader, not the characters
- The CED says readers' experiences with a text — the sentence is about you, not about anyone in the book.
- So the analysis names what the reader knows, expects or fears at a given page.
- A character's tension is plot; a reader's tension is structure.
The effect these structures produce is on...
A character's tension is plot; a reader's tension is structure.
Matching structure to effect
- Foreshadowing usually creates anticipation, because the reader now knows something is coming.
- In medias res usually creates suspense, because the reader does not yet know how anything connects.
- Neither pairing is automatic — say which effect this interruption produces, and why.
Ask what an interruption does
Interrupting chronology changes what the reader knows and when — and that is the whole answer.
Anticipation is knowing something is coming; suspense is not knowing how it ____.
Most passages produce one of the two, not both.
Anticipation and suspense are not the same effect. Anticipation is the reader knowing something is coming; suspense is the reader not knowing how it ends. A foreshadow that tells you a room will be opened creates anticipation; withholding what is inside creates suspense — and most passages do one, not both.
One piece of evidence is enough to show tension building.
Building is cumulative — the second instance confirms the first was deliberate.
Tension builds across a book
- Because building tension is cumulative, it is the effect that needs more than one piece of evidence.
- Two foreshadows are more than twice one, because the second confirms that the first was deliberate.
- So an argument about tension should quote from at least two places.
Put the interruption-function pass in order.
Only tension needs the last two steps — the other effects are local.
An interruption-function pass
- For each interruption you found, say what the reader knows immediately after it.
- Name the effect: anticipation, suspense, or tension building.
- For tension, find the second instance — one alone cannot show accumulation.
Chapter two names a locked room. Anticipation: the reader now expects it to be opened. Chapter nineteen mentions it again, unopened. Suspense: the reader now does not know whether it will be. Two mentions, and the second is what turns anticipation into building tension.
Chronology-breaking structures affect readers' experiences by creating anticipation or suspense or building tension — effects on the reader, not the characters. Anticipation = knowing something is coming; suspense = not knowing how it ends; tension builds, so it needs evidence from at least two places.