单选题 A long, imaginary prose (散文) story about people is usually called a novel.
It can be about any kind of man, woman, or child. It can be a- bout kins (空族) , or Chicago newsboys, or convicts (罪犯) , or housewives. The Frenchman, Victor Hugo, wrote his novel Les Miserables about a poor man who stole a loaf of bread to keep from starving (饿死).The American, Ernest Hemingway, wrote A Farewell to Arms about a young American with the Italian Army in World War I
A novel can tell the story of any kind of action, over any period of time. The modern Irish (爱尔兰的) writer, James Joyce, covers less than twenty-four hours in Ulysses. Yet Joyce takes a thousand pages to tell all that happens from the time one man gets up in the morning until he goes to bed early the next morning. A German writer,
Herman Hesse, uses only one hundred and fifty pages in his novel Demian to cover a boy's life from the age of ten until he becomes a young man.
A novel does not only tell the things that people do. It also tells why they do them. The Red Badge of Courage, by the American, Stephen Crane, tells about a young soldier in the War between the States who runs away the first time he is in battle. The book shows why he acted as he did. It describes his mental suffering until he overcomes his fears.
Character, action, motive (动机,主题)—this, then, is the stuff (要素) of which novels are made. And herein lies the reason for the novel's continuing popularity, despite changes in style and technique. People buy novels because they enjoy reading about other people. Alone among the literary forms, the novel satisfies the human craving (渴望) to know and understand our fellow creatures.