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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/31955
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Based on my experience in other fields that do have postulates, I'd say the sign of them is that they're positions which enjoy a consensus, seem too fundamental to be provable as such, and are a basis for other inferences. Based on what reader and writer alike consider, I'd suggest postulates of literature may include these:

- A writer shouldn't make you want to stop reading. (A lot of the advice you get on how not to write is based on evidence that readers dislike encountering such things.)
- Good writing persuades you of the author's opinions.
- Great literature shows a rich command of what the language can do, commensurate with its audience. (For example, although Dr Seuss couldn't use arbitrary vocabulary or sentence structure for his audience, he better understood what he could do within those constraints than did the countless children's authors who were much less successful.)

What these have in common is that, being oughts, we can't really prove them as such, but they do seem correct.

I am not, however, aware of a list of these you can look up.

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