My question is related to the dialogue tags discussion, but with a twist. How do I tag the dialogue in a story when "said" is not at all accurate of what they are doing? I tried calling in mindspeech and honestly, it was annoying. Now I'm using "thought" as a substitute for said. Let me show you a snipet to give you the idea...(conversation between young teen girl and her nanny)
“I don’t really want to go to dinner.” Clarica thought.
“I think your parents will be very upset with you if you don’t go.” Aberetta took a brush and began to run it through Clarica’s hair.
“Do you ever want kids of your own?” Clarica asked.
“I did.” Aberetta thought, wistfully.
“Not anymore?” Clarica asked, “You’d make a great mom.”
“Thank you.” Aberetta thought with a hint of pride, “But there’s no use longing for things you can’t have.”
So, as you can see, I've pretty much used a straight "thought" for "said" substitution here. When things like asked or replied are appropriate, or if no tag is necessary but some action should be inserted, I fall back on pretty typical conventions.
So, does it work? If not, does anyone have any better ideas? If this isn't enough to get the idea, I can send chapter 1 out, if anyone's interested. (The above is not from chapter 1. Couldn't find any stand alone dialogue from that chapter that would give you the idea.)
Thanks,
Christine
Once you establish that your characters are speaking mentally instead of vocally--and if you occasionally remind your readers of that--I don't think you'll have a problem
A question: have you considered how a character keeps others from knowing his private thoughts to himself?
Yes, I have thouroughly thought out this mental form of communication. It is not telepathy, I never call it that. In fact, I have characters make references to telepathy in the same sort of nonsense light we do to make sure the reader understands. Instead, it is a purposeful mind to mind communication. It requires both active sending and active receiving. So, just as you don't open your mouth if you don't want your thoughts known, my characters don't open their minds.
I know that it does make a difference, but since they certainly aren't mindspeaking in English--and there would be absolutely no reason for their language to have a word meaning "to communicate by means of vocalizations modulated by the mouth"--why not just use the word said as Balthasar suggests?
How about if you use the word "sent" instead?
I decided to go ahead and use the "sent" tag when appropriate. It's perfect because it neither gives the impression that the person is actually talking, nor does it lead the reader to think that this is conventional telepathy, which was another thing I was struggling with.
Thanks for all your help!
Belatedly and for what it's worth, "thought" works much more smoothly and appropriately for me than the other options. "Said" is incorrect if taken literally and may tend to let your readers forget that words are not being spoken aloud.
Regarding "sent," I can see two drawbacks. First, the implication of the word to me is that something is first composed then, separately, transferred. From what I gather, in this story thoughts simply come out the way speech would, such that that description of the process doesn't (for me) evoke the right sense.
The other drawback is that of some connotations which probably aren't quite right: "sent" sounds more effortful than "thought," and it also implies the possibility that something was not received.
Your use of "asked," etc. also works well for me. I would advocate for keeping it as is.
Best wishes,
Luc
Good luck with the story!
On the other hand, if I do change my mind, there is a modern marvel called find and replace. : )
What I wonder is how, in practical terms, this form of communication is actually different from vocal speech. Which no one else seems interested in asking or answering...but it probably matters a lot more than what you call it.
2. I see it as an evolutionary advantage. The aliens can communicate accross vaster distances without their prey or their enemy "hearing" them. I haven't narrowed down the range yet, but it'll be pretty far.
3. The aliens can communicate emotions as well as ideas. This makes communication more precise and potentially more intense.
4. During an emergency situation everyone within range of *anyone* can be nearly instantly aware of the crisis. I have this happen in one of my chapters, when a king dies, sort of like "the shot heard round the world" except this happens even faster.
5. Speaking of fast, entire conversations can happen in seconds. My dialogue has a difficult time capturing this advantage, although I'm looking for ways to demonstrate. This is particularly useful in crisis situations, which is another evolutionary advantage.
7. There are cultural implications, including that these people don't look at each other's mouths, it's rude, and in fact since the mouth is now only used for eating I have eliminated kissing, thinking they might think such an action to be gross.
I could probably go on, but does this at least help you get the idea?
I like the speed concept. Humans students often have trouble paying attention to instructors because the brain can process spoken words much faster than it can compose them. This might be due to the complexity of controlling the human speech organs. It's logical that your system of communications could be coded and decoded even faster.
You said:
quote:
The aliens can communicate emotions as well as ideas. This makes communication more precise and potentially more intense.
Another great concept. But this is going to challenge your writing ability. Normal dialogue is spoken in words that a writer can write. But communicating raw emotions will transcend words, so your word choices must be extra super-duper good. Unlike the sentence which you just read.
As for how to describe the form of communication itself, I think that you should borrow some words from radio communications, which it seems to resemble in many ways. A message can be tightbeamed to a single recipient, or broadcast to everyone in range, or whatever. You'll need several different words to indicate which type of sending is being used. You can just make the words up or use existing words, though the practical differences are great enough that I don't even see any reason to structure "dialogue" of this type using human dialogue conventions (basically, don't bother with quotation marks and so forth).
Another consequence of this powerful a form of communication is that it could easily be the only form of communication these aliens would use. There would be no point in developing gestures or facial expressions, or writing (certainly not phonetic writing, in any case) as a means of communication (I suppose that some type of glyphic or ideographic writing might be used as a means of keeping notes, though it would seem far more likely that persons with exceptional memory would become a valued social class, since anything could be communicated and remembered).
Is is possible for these aliens to lie using this form of communication? What about mimicry, pretending to be someone else? Making someone else feel emotions or sensations? That would be a good (read "evil" ) trick, eh? Make someone think that they were being confronted by an alien-eating monster when they were at a party, and watch the fun!
It's been a heck of a challenge to make the dialogue reflect the emotion in the thoughts. I know I could do better, but in the interests of actually finishing this sometime in my life I have just decided to keep writing and do touch ups later. I can always add emotion and description once I get the base story down.
You know what, Doc, I didn't think much about how increased speed of communication would increase their learning ability. (Most of my characters are past school age anyway.) I'll have to work that in, thanks!
I thought about the written language, but I finally decided to have one. It's root is pictographic, but they had to modify it for the computer era because thousands of pictures don't fit neatly into one entry pad (keyboard). As for facial expressions and gestures, I have been waffling on those. I finally decided to think back to some psychology theories, that physical changes in our body acutally precipitate emotions. (There is some sound basis for this.) So you frown, and THEn you're sad, or you smile and THEN you're happy. So what I finally decided was that while they use these physical gestures, most of the people can't interpret them and don't rely on them. A special few can and do though.
Another way I tried this dialogue thing, about a year ago, was to bolface the communication instead of using quotes. Sometimes I think about going back to it, but I'm just not sure yet.
Thanks for all your help everyone!
Good Luck Catharine
PE_Sharp
Does it matter if the characters physically hear what is being said or mentally? Other than developing a unique trait in the persons in your story.
Ultimately what I'm getting at is if your readers know that the communication is through thought, they won't forget it. So you are free to use whatever means you wish. But if you are intent on using "thought" or other means here are a short list of words you may consider,
"signal, indicate, hail, sign, call, cue, prompt, thought, cogitate, etc. These many not all fit what you want, but I decided not to limit the list."
I've also read books where thought communication is conducted in italics, or within symbols other than the typical (",") for example (<<,>> ) or something.
Well good luck!
The view point is from the aliens, and unless they have delt with people who actually speak, then their form of communication would equate to speaking. Since speaking is our word for a form of communications. So if the aliens "said" something, to the alien it is speach.
I also was wondering if you had concidered using said and not telling the reader they speak using thier minds? And if they did run into someone who used a vocal speach then it could make an interesting section. Just a thought.
If the entire story takes place among the aliens and there are not going to be any characters who speak vocally, I think you're better off just using "said." Anything else calls attention to itself and indicates you don't trust the reader to remember that these being communicate differently than we do.
In most cases -- for example, the conversation you posted between the girl and her nanny -- it makes absolutely no difference whether the characters are communicating vocally or mentally or by emitting coded pheremones. All that matters is the content of the communication. Except in situations where it is very important that the reader remember that the communication is direct mind-to-mind, I don't think you should distract the reader from the content.
When the communication includes more than just the words, I think the simplest solution is to use something like "sent" in conjunction with "said." For example:
"She was so embarrassed that she turned this color," she said, sending a mental image of the greenish hue.
Even though he was disappointed with his loss, he sent Jane a feeling of happiness and said, "Congratulations."
I've already decided to go with send, not said, and I'll tell you why. For one thing, I want to remind the reader that this is different from speaking. There are a few quirks to this form of communication that make it very different. I think I've already listed them.
But here's the big reason, and it's what finally eased my mind that I was making the right choice. This is the first novel in a trilogy. In *this* book the only contact with verbal speakers is frankly manufactured so that I can have a basis for comparison. But in the next two books a new main character will be introduced to share the limelight with the present one and she was born on earth and speaks verbally. I want to have an established pattern before that comes about so that I can continue to use send and said when appropriate and remain consistent.