What breaks the enchantment?

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Mister Underhill

Who says a character has to reference his audience in order to make his dialogue "in character voice"?

No one. But if this turns out to be Gandalf's habit, then a failure to do it raises questions. I'm researching it. So call that part of it a theory for now.

Originally Posted by Mister Underhill

The real question here, minus the jargon, is simply: Is Gandalf's dialogue believable as something that Gandalf would say, in a way that he would say it?

That's not the only 'real' question. The other question is whether a particular text that is spoken by Gandalf is more like scene narration by the author than it is like Gandalf's speech. I'm researching that too.

P.S. -- I'm not at all sorry for the sidebar conversation, as the baggage part of this seems to have by and large run its course, although Aiwendil's recent pot-stirring has started to make it interesting again.