If one clings to the idea of the protean, one will avoid all these mistakes and understand further that realism in the novel is not a question of following certain rules, that it has nothing to do with naturalism or mimicry, a novel not being like a photograph but more like an oil painting, or possibly in the case of the best novels a great fresco covering the walls and ceiling of a mighty palace, and so realism in the novel isn’t a question of technique; it is, in my opinion, a question of intention.
