During the Restoration, there were no rigid conventions governing the genre, and any work passed as a dialogue which represented a conversation between two or more persons or which was organized in a question-and-answer manner.[5] Frequently, dialogues resembled an interrogation or a catechism rather than natural discourse between real human beings. Often writers of such artificial dialogues abandoned any attempt at characterization or conversational verisimilitude, merely substituting "Q." and "A." to indicate a series of queries and responses. Sometimes authors identified the speakers with proper names but made no effort at actual characterization. Concern for dramatic realism varied from writer to writer; and all too often, improbable puppet-like creatures were represented in illogical, unbelievable, and contrived conversations. The artistic integrity of a successful dialogue, however, lies in the dramatic exchange of differing points of view or the interplay of opposing arguments in realistic conversation between credible characters with clearly differentiated personalities.
The stilted, artificial quality of some dialogues is in part attributable to the fact that many writers turned to the genre as a facile means of expressing a particular point of view.[6] As Purpus observes, the inherent dramatic quality of the form is lost if: 1) the writer substitutes invective, prejudice, and railing for realistic conversation, and/or 2) the author obviously contrives the dialogue merely to reflect his particular bias on a given question. On the other hand, although some writers used the form as a convenient frame on which to display their opinions, other writers erred by including too much dramatic machinery. Dialogues of this sort almost became short dramas.
No matter what the content or objective purpose of dialogues, however, they were uniformly written in what became known after the Restoration as the "plain, easy, and familiar" style.[7] Sentences were more conveniently broken up than heretofore, and there was increased lightness of tone. Though there was still a great deal of invective, Hugh Macdonald notes in "Banter in English Controversial Prose after the Restoration," that banter became prominent in the literature of disputation after 1660. On the other hand, "No one would expect to find a clear-cut division between banter, satire, sarcasm, burlesque, and abuse in every passage of a book written in the seventeenth century."[8] As Mr. Macdonald states, it is largely a question of emphasis. Employing a great deal of banter, Marvell reintroduced a tradition forgotten since the Marprelate tracts--that of treating a grave subject lightly yet with serious intention of reinforcing the argument. Restoration polemicists, with L'Estrange in the vanguard, quickly realized the advantages of this technique and claimed it as their own.