We’ve all heard the adage, “Show, don’t tell.” It’s practically the first thing any creative writing course teaches, after the formatting requirements, and I’ve made a pun off it myself. It’s sound advice, but like all short-form bits, it’s not
G.K. Chesterton’s poem Lepanto opens thus: “White founts falling in the courts of the sun, And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run; There is laughter like the fountains in that face of all men feared; It stirs