posted
I've thought for a couple months now whether to discuss dialogue methods. Several Hatrack members expressed difficulties composing dynamic dialogue in the meantime. So a few dialogue pointers that also apply to narration. wetwilly's discussion thread on Dramatic Beats also relates.
First, dialogue is one of the most important and influential features of written word creative writing. Character conversations close narrative distance, engage reader empathy and curiosity, and contribute to context and texture development---the who, when, and where and what, why, and how, respectively---of a narrative.
How a character's voice characterizes the character has a great amount to do with diction and syntax patterns and conventions. A formal voice implies sophistication. Awkward diction and syntax may imply a speaker trying to appear sophisticated but reveals the speaker isn't. An informal voice may imply a native's regional origin, a social status, a fiscal status, an education status, a relative temporal standing in regards to the moment of the action, an attitude toward persons of a particular character, like females, males, young, old, ethnicities, etc. So setting and character development may be implied through character voices.
First principles related to dialogue involve types thereof: echo, colloquy, non sequitur, and squabble. No more; no less, those four types of dialogue comprise the entirety of dialogue varieties.
Take squabble. No one says entirely what is meant or means entirely what is said, People conceal, withhold, distract, misdirect, flirt, contend, disgree, argue, debate, dispute, clash when they converse. People strive to fulfill their emotional needs, agendas, validate their opinions and positions, and impose their wills on others when they converse. These are all squabble dialogue features, some non sequitur too, as well as echo and colloquy dialogue.
Echo dialogue in varying degrees echos what was said previously, for purposes like striving for emotional alignment, persuading agreeableness, for building bonds, for irony, satire, sarcasm.
Non sequitur dialogue does not follow logically or rationally what was previously said. Non sequitur misdirects, changes topics, jumps ahead or back in chronology to leap past drollery or revisit partial details to glean more detail.
Examples of flat dialogue:
Urbane pleasantries in echo dialogue;
"Hello, Joseph," Melinda said. "How are you today?" "Hi, Melinda. I'm okay," Joseph said. "How are you?" "Fine, good, thank you for asking."
Flat disagreement in non sequitur (and echo, colloquy, and squabble) dialogue;
"You, you're the one knows," Hector shouted, "who shot Bill?" "Perry shot Dave?" Harry mumbled. "Not me." "Dave shot Bill?" Hector yelled. "I know," Harry whispered, "no one shot me. That's all."
The worst kind of colloquy dialogue leaves out also using echo, non sequitur, or squabble dialogue. Really, though, no conversation is ever as directly stated as a simple and direct question and answer exhange.
"Who won the Superbowl pool?" Artie asked. "Mary did," Edith said. "Did you have a pick?" Artie said. "Two picks," Edith said. "Both losers." "How many picks did Mary make?" Artie said. "Just one." Edith said. "lucky woman." "Yeah, but," Artie said, "she plays once and wins the first time, right?" "Yeah," Edith said, "once and done."
Beats or action, description, sensation, and emotion pauses in dialogue leavened into those dialogue bits, or any dialogue except rapid fire exchages, lends dynamic context and texture and meaning to the dialogue.
Artie slammed the office door, closing off the nosy cubicle rats outside. Storming up to Edith's desk, his forehead wrinkled, his eyebrows darting, his lips pursed tight, he asked "Who won the Superbowl pool?"
Not you, Edith thought, thankfully. He could be an intolerably painful backside. "Mary did," Edith said.
. . . and so on. Narration, thought, description, action, sensation, antagonsim, causation, and tension developing the context and texture of the conversation, emotional attitudes, setting, characters, and so on.
posted
I'll confess that I had never considered analyzing dialog in this way. My rules of thumb for dialog are quite different.
First and foremost, does it move the story forward? If you find that you're having Barbara explain to her mother for the third time that she doesn't want to go to the prom, it's a sign that you're spinning your wheels because you don't know where to take the story. At the end of a passage of dialog, something should have changed.
Second, having two characters disagree is more interesting to read than having them agree. (Basic conflict.)
Third, when two characters are talking, every 3rd speech should have a dialog tag or a bit of stage business to remind the reader which speaker is which. (If the speeches are short and the conflict sharp, every 5th speech.) I've seen how-to-write books that tell you you shouldn't need dialog tags in a two-person scene, because the reader should be able to tell just from the dialog who is talking, but as a reader I find it annoying to have to skip back to the top of the page (or the previous page) because I've lost track of which speaker is which. I like being reminded. Also, invisible voices floating in the air are not vivid. I want to see the characters frown, grin, shrug, stare at the ceiling, unconsciously clench their hand into a fist, or whatever.
There are also how-to-write books that will tell you the emotion in the dialog should be apparent from the spoken words. You shouldn't need adverbs like softly, sarcastically, and so on. But this is clearly bad advice. In natural dialog, a single short sentence might have three quite different meanings, depending on how it's spoken. The goal is not to force the spoken words to convey all of the necessary information; the goal is to make them read in a natural, speech-like manner, and fill in bits of extra information where needed.
Fourth, never start the paragraph with a dialog tag unless you're in a complicated scene with four or more active speakers. In that type of scene, yeah -- please start each paragraph with a tag:
Kevin said, "I'm not sure, Bob."
Dave shook his head firmly. "Ignore him, Bob."
Susan touched Dave's arm. "Please stay out of it, darling."
That may seem artificial, but it's always nice -- in fact, essential -- to let the reader know what's going on in a scene.
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posted
Dialog is one of my stronger areas so I'll give a couple of thoughts from what I've learned.
First, when I'm introducing characters to each other, unless I want to convey a very specific dynamic between the characters on first meeting I use a tell for the introductions. For example, 'John went around the room and introduced Sally to everyone on the team.' Then I can launch into the meat of the dialog.
Second, sometimes words that you avoid in exposition, particularly mitigating and vague words, are just what you need in dialog. 'Just, only, a little bit, somewhat, sort of,' etc. They're words that are natural for people to use when speaking. Not using them occasionally can make characters sound harsh.
Third, always keep the characters' voices at the forefront of the dialog (and in your mind). The way to need fewer speech tags is to have much of what your character says be something that only that character would say, either by position/task or personality. (ETA: This is not as mechanical as it sounds but should grow organically from your characters. It also helps to ensure that you're not wasting dialog on silly obvious stuff.)
Those are just a few thoughts and I'm sure there are exceptions to all of them. But I believe they're overall good rules of thumb. Take them as you will.
posted
One pet peeve I have is the new fashionable advice, as mentioned by Jim Aikin, to avoid describing the way the dialogue is being spoken. This is bull. How are you going to know if a character is whispering, muttering, speaking in a subdued tone, or talking in a normal voice? They all convey different impressions.
Yet I keep seeing people, on web page after web page, who actually get fired up about never using anything but a plain vanilla 'said' to describe how a person is talking. To me, that's not only stifling, it's boring.
1) He looked carefully along the hallway. "Stay here," he said. "I'll see if she's still alive."
2) He looked carefully along the hallway. "Stay here here," he choked out. "I see if she's still alive."
3) He looked carefully along the hallway. "Stay here," he said coldly, "I'll see if she's still alive."
4) He looked carefully along the hallway. "Stay here," he snarled. "I'll see if she's still alive."
Granted, you can convey the same information by writing a paragraph worth of infodump, and slowing down the pace of things significantly. but I really don't think it's worth it.
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Jim Aikin
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posted
He looked carefully along the hallway. "Stay here," he said with a barely suppressed titter, licking his lips. "I'll see if she's still alive."
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posted
Nuts and bolts dialogoe mechanics is at least as important as aesthetics, or structure and poetics, respectively. How-to guides and self-imposed rules develop structural consistency readers need for ease of reading and comprehension. Dialogue poetics appeals to readers, one method of which is through developing empathy and curiosity using voice and passionate contention, though both areas overlap more than they are separate.
One example of dialogue poetics from Jim Aikin's post, "Second, having two characters disagree is more interesting to read than having them agree. (Basic conflict.)
My writing vernacular avoids the term "conflict," though. It's overused in general writing discussions and meaningless to me from its many vague implied connotations. I'd say basic contention, or competition, and elevated to clash and perhaps confrontation, maybe conflagration. And more than "interesting," emotionally entertaining and appealing contention and competition. Though I've about had enough of the disagreeableness of the self-involved clash characters reality dramas portray and overemphasize as antisocial personalities. Too much poetic justice bores me.
Genevive42's poetics aesthetic from her post: "Third, always keep the characters' voices at the forefront of the dialog (and in your mind). The way to need fewer speech tags is to have much of what your character says be something that only that character would say, either by position/task or personality."
Yes, this. Dialogue, or thought, tags serve as a program to inform readers of who's speaking, or thinking, but they are invariably in narrator voice no matter how nearly invisible tags of the Jill or Joe said or he, she, it thought varieties are. Narrative distance opens by a mite from tags. Character voices close narrative distance and appeal to readers through them.
That latter is a prime motive behind why tags are deprecated, as rcmann notes; they open narrative distance. If the context and texture don't imply a dialogue line is whispered, "whispered" is almost as invisible as said. Part of the confusion of such half-baked writing "rules" comes from the said-bookism principle. Overwrought synonyms for said intended to avoid using the word "said" were fashionable once upon a time. However, sparse and timely use of strong synonyms for said can signal emphasis.
The infamous "ejaculated," for example, occurs seven times in William Thackeray Makepeace's Vanity Fair. He uses many other descriptive synonyms for said, too. Books with synonyms for said were advertised in writing magazine classifieds back between the Word Wars.
One other cause of the confusion is the admonishment not to use adverbs to describe how a dialogue line is said. The notorious "Tom Swifties"--"Tom Swift said swiftly"--illustrate the shortcoming of telling readers how to read and interpret how a speech is given. "Swiftly" adds nothing to the meaning when a more artful description or construction would serve.
However, how is a matter of texture for dialogue. An adverb describing how a dialgoue line is delivered may simplify reading ease and comprehension. Or a bit of description, action, thought, or emotion may serve instead. Variety, dramatic pauses, timely, judicious interruptions may emphasize and clarify and strengthen otherwise meaningless speech or thought.
Contrarily, tags too can be used as dramatic pauses when deployed judiciously and timely. And when direct discourse is strategically leavened with indirect discourse and description, action, sensation, and emotion, the variety spices a narrative.
Discourse poetics can be managed by keeping in mind the principles of emphasis, clarity, and strength. Emphasis, for example, by punctuating dialogue with said tags, with dramatic pauses, with setting, character, thought, emotion, and action descriptions, and with timely and judicious variety, particularly varying indirect and direct discourse.
posted
rcmann: I like the second one. Very colorful. It sounds familiar, too, since I'm from the South. ;)
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posted
Something I've been wondering is how do I indicate sarcasm? In my short story, I've written both "he said sarcastically" and "she said drily". extrinsic, what would you recommend as an alternative? I couldn't think of any synonym for "said" that has the same meaning. If you want to say they said it enthusiastically, you can use "enthused," but there is no "sarcasted" for "sarcastically".
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posted
@ Mayflower: I think a lot of it has to do with how well the character has been fleshed out. If the reader knows the character well enough to know what his opinion would be, then they can pick up on the sarcasm when he says the opposite.
"Barry proposed to me!" she said. "Awesome," Kris said.
If we know Kris well enough by this point to know she does not think Barry's proposal is awesome, then we know she is being sarcastic. In my WIP, there is a very sarcastic 1st-person narrator/MC, and I'm using this method a lot, I think to good effect (but we shall see about that when it's done).
There's also body language or tone of voice.
"Barry proposed to me!" she said. Kris raised an eyebrow and looked at her for a couple seconds before answering, her voice totally flat. "Awesome."
Another way that occurs to me is using other characters' reactions.
"Barry proposed to me!" she said. "Awesome," Kris said. "Why can't you just be happy for me?" she asked.
or simply...
"I don't need the sarcasm," she said.
My $0.02, because this is something I've been doing a lot lately in my WIP. Hopefully at least one of these ideas is useful for you.
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Signaling sarcasm with words only, like the related rhetorical figures satire and irony, and other related rhetorical figures, challenges writers. Albert Mehrabian notes in his landmark communication studies that 7 percent of communication regarding liking or not liking is the words themselves, 38 percent from intonation, and 55 percent from nonverbal expression like gestures, facial expression, and body language. Or verbal, vocal, and visual expression. Writers only have words--the verbal aspect--for expressing and portraying meaning.
I would remark on "said sarcastically" or "said drily" in almost every case for reconsideration. They do tell how a speech is given, but they are Tom Swifties. They summarize and explain a character's behavior that as a best practice ought to be shown through a written-word imitation of the behavior so that readers interpret for themselves that intended behavior. Contrarily, if the context and texture of the "said sarcastically" dialogue tag were sarcastic or ironic itself, maybe that would appeal to me.
A near infinite variety of methods are available for showing sarcasm that are context dependent, the who, when, and where the sarcastic remark is made, and the what, why, and how texture of the sarcastic remark.
To begin with a first principle, sarcasm is closely related to irony, where hierarchally irony is a parent rhetorical figure and sarcasm is a child figure. Irony expresses one meaning on its surface and another meaning figuratively: verbal irony, situational irony, dramatic irony, comic irony, and courtly irony. According to the Silva Rhetoricae, irony is "Speaking in such a way as to imply the contrary of what one says, often for the purpose of derision, mockery, or jest."
For sarcasm: derision, mockery, jest, and bitter irony are keywords for its functions.
Sarcasm can be situational, meaning incidental to a particular occasion's moment; or extended, meaning spanning a part or a whole occasion.
You ask for guidance on a situational sarcasm. One form of sarcasm that expresses irony is a litotes. A litotes affirms the positive of an understated negation statement, sometimes using an interjection part of speech exclamation, often a sentence fragment, which is another method by itself for expressing sarcasm.
A litotes example: Oh no you didn't just dis my baby father. "Oh no" is the exclamation, "you didn't just dis my baby father" is the litotes, meaning the person addressed did dis the baby father. Them's fighting words.
Other methods for portraying sarcasm develop context and texture, may describe actions, gestures, facial expressions, nonverbal body language, or be interpreted as a revelation, discovery, or realization by a character through a thought or two, maybe three. Setup and follow through of the dramatic situation is crucial.
A sarcastic remark given in a natural situation for it may be appropriately interpreted by readers as intended, or if given suddenly may be a pleasant surprise that would then need to have its meaning developed soon afterward.
Using the litotes example above, say the lead-in is a comment by the other speaker about the baby father tomcatting around the other side of the tracks. That's a setup. I think a prior step for setup is needed though. Courtly irony would be my resort, Courtly irony often condemns using faint praise, or the opposite, praising with faint condemnation.
The offending speaker might say "Your baby father ain't all that intolerable." Then the offended speaker might say "He can be a pill when he's feeling bouggie." "Bouggie like when he's uptown hitting on club hens?" the offender says. "Oh no you didn't just dis my baby father," the offended says. Further context and texture development would add in where, when, how, and why details, and so on, the exchange takes place. Some through prior set up, some through in the moment vocal and visual description observations and thought reactions of either party.
Setup, follow through, context, texture, description, action, vocal and visual sensation, thought, emotion, and rhetorical figures develop sarcasm in the dramatic situation so that readers can interpret the meaning as intended.
This at length discussion of sarcasm I feel develops methods for addressing the complex nature of expressing sarcasm. Sarcasm is challenging to express in writing, hence, the lengthy discourse.
posted
I love seeing the different variations of the same piece of dialogue to show different methods or meanings! Perhaps it would be interesting and instructional to have a "spin this line" discussion or something where everyone can offer variations to demonstrate different emotions, meanings, writing methods.... anyway I'm learning a lot just by reading these snippits of dialogue!
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posted
Thank you, Extrinsic, for this discussion, it's opened my mind to a whole new world of dialogue that makes me excited to go back and overhaul my dilapidated dialogue.
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posted
Thanks, extrinsic and wetwilly. Your comments were very helpful. It seems like this is a case of "show rather than tell." Because I tend to better absorb information when I review it, here is a summary of what I've gathered from the two of you. Methods for indicating sarcasm include: 1) flesh out the character so sarcasm is easily detected, 2) describe body language and tone of voice, 3) have other characters comment or react to the sarcasm, 4) set up for the sarcasm in the preceding context (with a lead-in and possibly more setup), 5) use a litotes (affirming positive of an understated negation statement) with or without an interjection, 5b) an interjection can be used alone.
And because I liked this list from extrinsic...
quote:Originally posted by extrinsic: Setup, follow through, context, texture, description, action, vocal and visual sensation, thought, emotion, and rhetorical figures develop sarcasm in the dramatic situation so that readers can interpret the meaning as intended.
posted
You're welcome, legolasgalatica and mayflower998.
Taking the Mehrabian communication studies into account for writing too, 7 percent or more dialogue could be a useful formula for how much dialogue and how much context and texture it could use. Thirty-eight percent vocal is probably way too much intonation; it can be implied though. Fifty-five percent or less visual content is not too much in situational circumstances.
My dialgoue tends to be more like 25 percent or more and could use more visual and other aural sensations, more thought, more action, more setting, and especially the larger relative settings surrounding events in order to develop scene authenticity. My focus is too tight, more often than not. More wide-angle variety wouldn't hurt.
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posted
You're welcome. You just happened to ask about something I've been playing with recently, so I happened to have some fresh thoughts handy.
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