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Topic #244
Do you embrace dialog or narrate your way around it? Why?
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With every written work, moderation and balance are the keys to a solid piece. My own style is a bit of what I call a chatty visual work. Being someone who is focused on screenwriting, not just novels, I tend to weigh dialogue as integral. Not all writers do. Many like narrative heavy work.
But, isn’t the narrative just a form of dialogue? It is the narrator talking to the reader–telling them the story. Yes. And, dialogue is an art unto itself. If your dialogue isn’t good, it can really take down a story (and if it’s great it can uplift mediocre narratives).
Have you ever read a Lovecraft story? Many of them could be characterized as dialogue, as they’re written in first person, post event story narratives. The narrator is telling you everything. First person, to me, is just dialogue. If pressed, I’d even say, it’s exposition. When you think about it, it’s just a person telling you everything that happened.
Exposition, supposedly, is the hallmark of bad writing. Show don’t tell is the mantra of writing classes and gurus. One solution to show and not telling is via the use of dialogue–especially in screenwriting. Certainly, you can still identify it as exposition, because it really is. Keep in mind: exposition is okay to a certain degree, like when you’re stuck on time and alternatives. But, yes, there is a way to really mess it up, and it’s easy to do. I find myself annoyed by television and movies that overuse the tool. Often it’s clunky and obvious.
My books use chatty visuals to get the emotions across along with the character profiles. They unfold the population of the book over time. How will they react to something? Think about this: how characters start doesn’t always predict how they will end, but tones are also a clue to feeling and meaning–the ever important inflection. Just as in life, characters in books show and hide as they will. how is it effective? One way is if the way a character speaks evolves over time. This suggests something to hear: a change in perspective, feeling, or something learned.
It’s much better to have a character say something a certain way to get across a sentiment than to say they feel a way about something. Yet, when another characters detects something is not quite accurate in what they see and hear, that is often an inner dialogue through narration.
Sometimes, they will challenge the other character directly. In that, the reader should detect a heightened emotion, the stakes are higher, and even character flaws like anxiety. A direct challenge is like a red flag. It informs readers how a narrative is likely to develop throughout the book: is this character high-strung? Are they dangerous? Is something upsetting them, and what is it? Will they be able to deal with what is coming, or will they suffer terribly for it? Will what happened cause a reaction that further drives the narrative? Does something need to happen to teach them how to control themselves?
A character is unlikely to get shrill without a bit of stress, unless you’re expressing that they have a lack of emotional control. This shapes the characterization. One should be mindful of how the characters are saying things and why, but also what they’re not saying. How do you not say something that should be known to the reader but remain unknown to the characters?
Reactions are unspoken dialogue. The body language (crossed arms, legs, a step back, a sigh, flicking through a magazine testily) of a character conveys chatty visuals well! In this way, you show, instead of telling: Margaret was testy at this statement. vs. Margaret snapped through the magazine in dour focus, wrinkling the fragile leaves. Likely before the snapping pages, she simply browsed them.
The balancing act of narration and dialogue is probably one of the places where writers most often fail. Not only is writing excellent dialogue a trick to learn, but understanding the pauses, the unsaid, and the usefulness of both to convey meaning is equally as powerful. Look to life for how to accomplish this. If the writing (dialogue or narration) is unnatural, it will fail with the reader. How do people converse? Everyone does know this. Yet, it’s the writer’s job is to capture it on paper. Word choices matter, just as in real life.
What does a chatty visual look like on paper? It looks like a movie in written form. That’s the clearest explanation I have. A chatty visual book is one where the dialogue snaps. It makes sense, sounds natural, and develops a deeper understanding of the character (whether they’re lying or telling a truth). Life isn’t spent in headspace alone. There are conversations throughout it. Communication is a human activity. There is a balanced duality.
If one wrote about a lonely man locked in a cabin in the wastes of an Alaskan winter, you might not have dialogue. For such a story, third person wouldn’t be most effective. A narrative first or second would likely be the best course. The dialogue-nature of the narration creates that chatty visual with which the reader can relate. Either they’re being told the story by the person who experienced it, or by someone second hand to that story. Either way, it’s dialogic. Right?
Balance, in the end is key. How a writer achieves that balance depends on the narration style. Of course, choose wisely how characters speak as well as what they say, because those words do the heavy lifting of characterization and propel the story forward.
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If I was that lonely person locked in a cabin I’d talk to myself, lol!
You’d have to. I remember seeing a film about someone losing their language ability because they were isolated so long. Imagine forgetting how to talk?!
I see the story as a film in my head and just write what happens, maybe that’s why I prefer dialogue to narration?
I do, too. I think so.
I like the concept of reactions being unspoken dialogue.
“Body Language” is just as necessary in writing as in daily IRL communication. Absolutely.
That’s an interesting thought at the end — that narrative becomes like dialogue if you’re focused on a single person. I can see that in Jack London’s writings – how he’s telling you a story about the death of a man who couldn’t start a fire after falling in the creek, for example. It wouldn’t be appropriate for the story to be first person – the guy dies, so he’s obviously not telling the story. But you do get the feeling that someone is telling the story to someone. Not someone who was there, but someone who observed it. There is a definite feeling of dialogue — or at least monologue, like a guy sitting in the saloon entertaining a bunch of greenhorns around the woodstove with the Alaskan version of a ghost story.
Yes! Exactly!
I’m going to agree full steam with all of that except the last bit, and I disagree not to start world war III but on semantic terms. And based on my own experience which might be lacking. Dialogic requires, as I was taught, a back and forth. At its most basic, and contemporary, a request to answer a “short survey” from your bank or grocery store. “How are we doing?” ie – Dialogic in the social media world. Engage and respond. But still a two-way process. First-person “I shot the sheriff”, or the other unidirectional form that I call the Lake Woebegone syndrome, are straight info delivery/storytelling. I survived 47 days in a life raft is not dialogic unless they present it in public with Q&A and then we get into not only public relations but marketing, education, all the various formats where dialogic is used for back and forth going back to the argumentative Greeks. Or hard close used car salespersons. Just my .02. “Dia” are almost interchangeable, as dialogic is the process of opening and sustaining a dialog. Oh well, not nit picking, but dialog to me means at least two interpersonally communicating and uni is uni.
The good thing is ass you said, chatty can be dialed up or down for tone and revelation.
Ass? And it’s not Monday? Sorry.
Ha! I’m so used to typos because of my autocorrect on Twitter that I barely notice them anymore. Probably not a good thing for my editor.
The back and forth is with the reader and their thoughts. It is very much two-way. The narrative doesn’t exist without the reader to read it into life.
I like the term “chatty visuals.” I tend to call them “beats.” I consider inner dialogue as a form of dialogue. Instead of an omniscient narrator telling the reader what’s happening, the author draws the reader into the character’s head to hear what they are saying to themselves.
that innerspace can be very important! If we don’t have that tool to leverage in a writing, we miss an opportunity to not just enrich the narrative/plot, but also to make use of an effective communication device. Writers should be careful, though, because it can become too much. As always: use when it is necessary and most interesting.