What you called the"birds-eye view" might also be called an establishing
shot
Not by Twain, though.

On Aug 25, 2016 1:27 AM, "Joe Alvarez" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

How about "zoom in"? That is what is happening in your description.

Joe Alvarez
900 Havel Court
Charlotte, NC 28211-4253
Telephone: 704.364.2844
FAX: 704.364.9348

Sent from my iPad

> On Aug 24, 2016, at 8:33 PM, Wesley Britton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>=20
>=20
>=20
> I have a question about one passage in Life on the Mississippi. I suspect
i=
t
> will be very familiar to many of you.
>=20
>=20
>=20
> It's the passage where we first get a birds-eye view of a place along the
> river before Twain narrows his focus to one town, then one street, then
on=
e
> house, then a sleeping man on a porch.
>=20
>=20
>=20
> Back in grad school, a professor used a term to define this technique of
> moving from the general to the specific, but I can't figure out now what
> term he meant.
>=20
>=20
>=20
> Any ideas?
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
> Dr. Wesley Britton
>=20
> Author, Beta-Earth Chronicles
>=20
> www.drwesleybritton.com
>=20
>=20