Surely it must now be evident that if a dramatist should in the first place understand perfectly that illustrative action is the core of drama, and must be carefully selected; and secondly that he must, among possible illustrative actions, select those which quickest will produce the largest emotional results; he must also recognize that till he has searched and probed his situations by means of the characters, in the first place he cannot know which are his strongest, and in the second place cannot hope to hold the situations chosen.
Another complaint from the inexperienced dramatist when shaping up his story is that though he sees the big moments in his play, he does not see his way from one to another. That is, transitional scenes are lacking. They will not worry him long, however, if he follows the methods just stated for holding a situation. Let him watch the people who have come into his imagination, first simply as people. Who and what are they? Secondly, what are they feeling and thinking in the situations which have occurred to him? He can't long consider this without deciding what people they must have been in order to be in the situations in question. Hard upon this comes the question: "What will people who have been like these and have passed through this experience do immediately, and thereafter?" In the answer to the question, "What have they been?" he finds the transitional scenes which take him back into an earlier episode; in the answer to "What will they become?" the transitional scenes that carry him forward. In the scene cited from _Richard II_ the main moments are the home-coming, the discovery of the traitorous paper, and the departure of the Duke and Duchess of York. How is the transition from one to the other to be gained? Through knowledge of the characters, as the analysis showed. What applies here to transition within a scene from dramatic moment to dramatic moment applies equally in transition from scene to scene. Suppose that Sir Arthur Pinero had as the starting-point of the third act of _The Magistrate_ the idea that Mrs. Posket should be arrested under such conditions that she must appear in the court of her husband when he is as guilty as she. Sir Arthur has decided that they must be in some place like the Hotel des Princes when it is raided. He has in mind episodes which will bring them all together at that place. He already sees clearly the scene of the raid and the arrest. But the place cannot be raided till late in the evening, and Agatha Posket is too jealous of her reputation thoughtlessly to stay late in such a place. What are to be the transitional "scenes" which, in the first place, shall make us feel that considerable time has passed since Mrs. Posket came to the hotel, and secondly shall keep us amused? Sir Arthur finds them through the characters. It is the hunger of self-indulgent Charlotte which motivates the staying and gives us the supper "scene." It is the character of Vale which gives us his quarrel with Lukyn. The love making of Charlotte and Vale provides another transitional "scene." In other words, whether one is looking for more episodes or for transitions from one chosen episode to another, one should not go far afield hunting episodes as episodes, but should become acquainted with the characters as closely as possible. They will solve the difficulties.