SPA Girls Podcast – EP165 – He Said, She Said – Creating Dazzling Dialogue

Posted By SPA Girls on Dec 12, 2018 | 2 comments

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Love or hate it, dialogue is an essential element to fiction writing.

Done well, dialogue can be very powerful. We know and understand the subtext of dialogue without having to be told, and writers can use this to create amazing scenes and tense moments.

Done badly, however, dialogue can kick your readers out of the scene, make them frustrated and ultimately stop reading.

So how do you make sure your dialogue sings instead of stinks? Easy peasy! Just listen to this episode… 🙂

Today in the SPA we go through what dialogue is, how to use it to your best advantage, we give you some dialogue techniques, talk about ways you can use dialogue to amp up your scene, and work through some of the do’s and don’t’s for creating dialogue that dances on the rooftops!

Show Notes: 

Basics of Said/Exclaimed etc

– Dialogue isn’t just filler. It has to work hard. It epitomises the conflict of the story you’re telling.

– We’re more interested in a story when it comes through via a dialogue than description. It’s more active.

– Said is a word people don’t see when they read, so don’t worry about using it, just not too much!

– It is also good to change things up slightly, you don’t want to sound monotonous,

– While you can use said often, it’s not the same for verbs. “shouted,” “exclaimed,” “laughed,” “snorted,” “demanded”, “insisted,” “screeched,” “screamed,” ” maintained” etc.

An example of overkill: 

“I think that’s your worst look yet,” Jessie said sighing.

“Surely not, I look seriously hot,” Melanie pouted.

“It’s the pink scarf, with the pink sunglasses, and don’t get me started on the pink hair,” Jessie maintained.

“You’re jealous,” Melanie declared.

– Don’t overuse words alongside said either, just because you think it’s boring. Words like grimly, or hotly etc. Extra words are not needed and clutter dialogue.

– If there are only two people in the scene, you shouldn’t need too many “he said/she said” moments.

– A quote followed by an action will always indicate who’s talking.

– When we are face to face, we get visual clues from body language as well as the words being spoken. You can use that to help indicate what the person is feeling without having to say:

“I think we should go home,” he said angrily.

“I think we should go home,” he said, slamming his fist into the kitchen table.

“I think we should go home.” His eyes filled with tears and he turned away.

“I think we should go home.” She smiled radiantly and held up her engagement ring to catch the light.

– Good to have those books – Negative and positive emotion thesaurus etc. Body language by Barbara and Alan Pease, and the language of love books.

– people’s eyes are naturally drawn to white space in a book. In a non-fiction book you can sort this out by having loads of headings and sub headings. In a fiction book, this is the dialogue.

Dialogue is the same as a scene – if it’s not relevant, cut it!

– You need to know what each character wants, and that needs to come out in the dialogue. (Think of Katniss in the Hunger Games. As soon as her sister’s name is called out – “I volunteer as tribute.” No more powerful words. We know she’s basically volunteering to die for the sake of her sister. She would do anything for her sister, and she shows it through those small words.)

– know the conflict and amp it up. Characters can’t just leave the scene, they have to fight against the conflict or there is no story.

– Remember don’t let the dialogue ramble, sometimes you just need to sum up the situation with a paragraph or two. As an article by Jericho Writers (see links below) says “Get in late and out early. Don’t bother with small talk. Decide the point of each interaction, begin with it as late as possible, ending as soon as your point is made.”

– Dialogue can give away a lot about where someone comes from, and the kind of person they are. “So where did you learn to cook like that?” “I did three years in an International Culinary School in Paris.”

– Be careful about overloading dialogue with jargon, or dialogue specific to a country. “Dinna fash lassie!” “Sweet as bro.”

– It’s vital that dialogue flows, or you will lose the readers attention

Famous lines of dialogue, and why they’re so good:

“ET phone home.” (It sums up what ET is fighting for the whole movie. He’s desperate to get home the whole movie.”

“You want the truth? You can’t handle the Truth!” It was the snapping point for the character. He was desperate to tell them what he’d done, he wasn’t ashamed of it, and the lawyer (Tom Cruise) just had to goad him into it.

“Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.” Rhett’s final words to Scarlett.

“Hasta la Vista, Baby.”

“I’ll be back.”

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

“We’ll always have Paris.”

“In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”

Dialogue as descriptor

– If you have to explain how someone is feeling as they’re speaking you’re not doing a good job with your dialogue, or creating the scene or picture in the readers head. “Never say you’re actually doing it,” Sarah said frowning. “I am, and you just wait and see it will work out,” Pete said snorting.

– Remember to show don’t tell in some situations. If you have to say he said angrily, it looses its punch, and suggests the reader can’t work it out for themselves what’s going on, which in turn says you haven’t created the scene well.

– If the dialogue is good, it can include action also. “You’re an idiot, put down that knife.”

– Really good dialogue will stand on it’s own.

– Sometimes what characters say tells us a lot about them, and their backstory. For example, if they have no wish to discuss their past, perhaps they have issues? “Will you come with me to the Christmas Parade, Jake?” “I don’t do Christmas.” We have to wonder why?

– As with any scene, know what the point of the dialogue is. Know what is going on in the heads of the characters and make sure that comes across in what they’re saying. Don’t be lazy and just tell. Think of ways to show how they’re feeling through the dialogue.

Tricky tips for Creating Great Dialogue

– Clever dialogue is oblique (see anything written by Aaron Sorkin or the Gilmore Girls rapid fire dialogue) per Jericho Writers – “So direct dialogue is where person X says something or asks a question, and person Y answers in the most logical, direct way.

We hate that! As readers, we hate it.

Oblique dialogue is where people never quite answer each other in a straight way. Where a question doesn’t get a straightforward response. Where random connections are made. Where we never quite know where things are going.

As readers, we love that. It’s dialogue to die for.

…Want to achieve the same effect? Just keep your dialogue not quite joined up. People should drop in random things, go off at tangents, talk in non-sequiturs, respond to an emotional implication not the thing that’s directly on the page – or anything. Just keep it broken. Keep it exciting!…”

– The dialogue should elicit emotion, in the same way your wider story should. A scene in a kitchen with two people making tea and sitting down to drink it, and discussing the weather – shouldn’t be about that at all. If it is, it’s the most boring scene in the world. There should be undercurrents of tension. What is it that these two characters are fighting against? Has one of them just found out the other is cheating with her husband? Does one of them owe the other money, but can’t repay it? Have their kids been fighting? Expelled for stealing?

– If you want to amp up the dialogue, amp up the scene. A couple having a fight? What about a couple having a fight while on a boat in shark infested waters? A girl finally deciding to tell her crush how she feels? What about if she did it while he was out on a date with another girl?

– Different kinds of dialogue for different genres. Fast and snappy in thrillers, more thoughtful and romantic in romance.

– Try to become your characters as you write them. Slip into their heads and write what they would say.

– Say it aloud, to see how it sounds

– Remember the way we speak in person is not the same as sparkling dialogue on a page

– Some writers just write the dialogue in a scene first, and add in the descriptors later.

HELPFUL LINKS:
www.thecreativepenn.com/2012/10/04/dialogue-mistakes/
Jericho Writers How To Write Dialogue In Fiction: https://jerichowriters.com/writing-dialogue/

Book: How To Write Dazzling Dialogue by James Scott Bell
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KN0JEYA/