The author was a highly skilled narrator and all his tales are admirably told. “W.S.” comes from “The Complete Short Stories of L. P. Hartley. ”
A close study of the story for the purpose of examining its style involves a careful observation and a detailed description of the language phenomena at various levels.
The text of the fragment is complete in itself and it is interesting from the point of view of its idea. The excerpt is not homogeneous: the narration is interrupted by the elements of description; inner thoughts and feelings of the main character are imperceptibly interwoven with the narration. The type of the narration is author’s narrative. Also we can observe non-personal direct speech. The type of character drawing is direct because while reading this very excerpt we get information about the character and it may be said that the author tries to thrust his opinion on the readers.
The very structure of the story adds to the effect of implication but the actual meaning of what is going on is not clear at the beginning of the story as he feelings suggested by the writer are not precisely determined. The reader however feels that something had happened and the character is strained and full of hidden apprehension and suppressed emotions.
What strikes one’s eye at the first glance is that the tension of the atmosphere in this excerpt is gradually increasing and gets its top at the end of it. The text can be logically divided into only one part: the story itself. According to this kind of division the fragment has opened plot structure. We can also divide the text into the following supra-phrasal unities:
1. The postcards
2. Anonymous correspondent
3. Wondering
4. Difficulties
5. The woman
6. Piece of him
7. Panic
8. Police
The most of the supra-phrasal unities