Ah, those Inner Voices....

So the subject here is inner dialogue and what it reveals about the lead character in your story. The answer is easy enough and one of my favorites: It reveals as much as you want to reveal. How lovely is that?

There are a lot of variables with this particular subject. The question really is how much do you want to reveal? If the main character is a man of mystery as it were, you might want to reveal amazingly little. On the other hand, the wiser way to handle that might be to have the character in question seen and observed by someone else, thus avoiding any internal monologues. Example given: It was Watson who narrated the Sherlock Holmes stories. For that reason we only saw as much of Holmes’ mind as Watson was privy to.

I like what characters have to say to themselves. I think it reveals a good deal about them and that’s one of the things I like about books over movies. To be fair, there’s normally a lot I prefer about books to movies, but that’s one of the big ones for me.

I did a story called SMILE NO MORE in which the main heavy is a dead clown. Okay, he’s rather active for a dead clown, and he’s a bit of a basket case, but I also decided to reflect that in how I approached the novel. Certain sections were done in the first person, from two different time frames within the same character’s mind. There’s a lot of internal dialogue. The rest of the novel is told third person, limited omniscience. There’s even more internal dialogue, but it’s from the perspective of the people who are dealing with the aforementioned dead, insane clown. You may rest assured that how they see the clown is a bit different than how he sees himself. He is, of necessity, the hero of his own story. His motives, his actions, his reactions all make perfect sense to him, and as a result of how the story is written, I managed to pull off a very important part of the tale: I managed to evoke a fairly strong sense of sympathy for an exceedingly unsympathetic character. More than one reader and reviewer both complimented me and chastised me for making them like a man who is very much a monster. I take that as a point of pride. It means I managed to pull off what I was trying to get across.

The thing is that I think if a writer handles the internal monologue(s) properly, you can learn a lot not only about the main character(s) but also about how others see them. In a few cases in SMILE NO MORE the characters that our—I hesitate to call him a “hero”—encounters are genuinely not nice people. They sort of deserve what they get. Okay, maybe not to the level that is dealt out, but they sort of deserve justice for the things they are doing or have done. A good deal of what makes them reprehensible is only seen through their internal monologues. It was a challenge to make them seem human and a challenge to make Rufo the Clown seem like a nice guy. Their own thoughts are what made that possible and I’m genuinely not sure if the story could be told as easily in a movie format for that exact reason.

That’s just one example, of course, but it works as an example of why I think the internal voices of characters are significant to driving a story.

Jim Moore

Our Hero: Rufo The Clown

Turning the Private into the Public - Games with Internal Monologue

It's getting to be summer here in Santa Fe and I'm having a lovely time getting our patios all set up for long hours of enjoyment.

This week's topic is Internal Monologue: What it reveals about your POV character. I admit I felt a little frisson of pleasure when I saw it, though I'm quite sure I didn't suggest this one. See, I'm the Queen of Internal Monologue.

Or, at least, my heroine from the Covenant of Thorns series, Gwynn, is.

And yes, she's the POV character - which means the story is told from her point of view. It's first person, which is a very close perspective. The reader is essentially riding around in her head, hearing her thoughts. It's a fun way to tell a story, because we discover aspects of the new world she's been plunged into - Faerie - along with her. We are also there when she figures things out, though a smart reader without Gwynn's particular emotional biases or blind spots might get there ahead of her.

A huge part of the story, however, is informed by her internal monologue.

I would have guessed this concept came from theater, but a bit of slapdash Google research reveals that it began as a literary device.

The term interior monologue is often used interchangeably with stream of consciousness. But while an interior monologue may mirror all the half thoughts, impressions, and associations that impinge upon the character’s consciousness, it may also be restricted to an organized presentation of that character’s rational thoughts. Closely related to the soliloquy and dramatic monologue, the interior monologue was first used extensively by Édouard Dujardin in Les Lauriers sont coupés (1887; We’ll to the Woods No More) and later became a characteristic device of 20th-century psychological novels. (http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/290310/interior-monologue)

 It is notable that it's a more recent device. Jane Austen's novels, for example, are interesting in that they have practically no internal monologue. The reader gathers how the people think and feel from their actions and what they do and don't say. But they don't ruminate on their feelings.

Gwynn, however, is a thoughtful person. And by that I mean, full of thoughts. She's an academic, a scientist, and she's trained herself to be analytical, to take notes and examine the world from an objective standpoint. As many "in-their-heads" people do, her thoughts run All The Time. It's nearly impossible for her to shut it off.

Amusingly - to me as an author, though it's infuriating for her as a character - in Faerie, her thoughts can be overheard. Particularly by her would-be lover and nemesis, Rogue. If she's not careful, which can happen when she's either emotionally involved or really interested in something - which amounts to the same thing, really - she gets "loud."

And he calls her on it.

It's a fun way to play with her subtext, which should be available only to her and to us, her readers and voyeurs. Instead of being private, it becomes public, at least to Rogue, who uses every advantage he can to sneak inside her motivations and direct them towards his own ends.

Or maybe he just wants to understand her better.

At any rate, it's one of those fun author-games to play, that often leaves me chortling as I wiggle in my seat.

Who says an author's life isn't glamorous??

He Said She Said I Said They All Said What Hasn't Been Said?

So we've had our own little "He Said, She Said" going on this week, all about dialogue tags. Most of the time I love being the last word  on a topic, so to speak, holding down the Saturday spot, but this week I got nuthin. Well, nothing much to add anyway - my colleagues have thoroughly discussed the issues in their usual brilliant and unique styles and I'm in violent agreement. Actually the first thing that always comes to my mind when I hear the phrase "He Said, She Said" is the greatly under-appreciated Kevin Bacon-Elizabeth Perkins 1991 comedy of the same title. Maybe I'll just sneak out of here early and cue up the dvd player....

Enough said!

You Say Spice, I Say Side Dish

Dialog tags are for clarity. They're a spice, not a side dish. Not that you'd know that by reading *my* latest draft. But, hey. That's what revisions are for, right?

Jeffe brought up the point about voice. It's a good one. Because not only should the author have a distinct voice, so should each of the characters. If those voices are specific and unique to each major character in a story, What someone says should tell you who said it. This is over and above using action to bracket dialog.

Random example. Sam's a good ole boy getting by on charm. Sarah's a former girly girl who's had to break a few fingernails in order to go on eating.(Facts that would have been established by you in the early course of your story about this pair.)

"I loathe this town and everyone in it."
"Careful, darlin'. I'm in this town, So're you."
"You consider vermin stew to be the height of culinary art. And I'm slogging through the mud and devil's club to find the fluffy little bastards I have to murder to make it. My hate is universal. Where are you going?"
"To haul up a mess of water. Seems to me ain't nothing wrong with you that a soak in a hot bath wouldn't cure. I got to change your mind about hate me, don't I?"
"You just want me naked."
"How else am I going to turn that hate around, darlin'?"

Sure, silly, over the top stuff. But it's to prove the point that the above dialog needed no 'he said', 'she said' tags because the character spoke with different voices. Those should be identifiable anywhere in the story. Not that you won't ever tag someone's dialog. Subtle reminders of who's in a scene are always useful. Especially for me. I'm totally guilty of having several people in a scene, a couple of them start talking and I lose track of the rest of the characters - they vanish into the woodwork.

Whenever you have more than two or three people in a scene, dialog tags are unavoidable. Even if all those people have distinct voices, you'll have to tag or attach someone's dialog to their action.

If someone has something to say aloud in a scene, that someone has a stake in the scene. Otherwise, why say anything? It's easy to see in my random two person snippet above. Sarah's complaining, and maybe longing for a manicure. Her stake is a desire for change. Sam's stake maintaining the status quo - fixing it. In scenes with multiple characters - three or more - every person who speaks must be invested in whatever is going on in that scene. And when people are invested, they care. They lean in. They speak quickly. There's precious little dead air. Tags are going to speed up the verbal battle. Action, unless it's super short and adding to the conflict, will slow it down slightly.

You can control the pace of conflict. Did you ever watch any TV Sitcoms? Especially the ones with several people in the cast - once in a while, they'd gather everyone in the cast together in one scene. Usually one with ultra-high stakes (well, you know, for a sitcom). The dialog flies back and forth. There's barely time for a breath between speakers. The characters interrupt one another and rarely actually deal with whatever problem brought them together in the first place. Tags with little to no action come closest to that pace.

Break a high conflict, fast paced patch of dialog with action in response to something someone says and you can ratchet tension way up (or down - whatever your preference).

In a scene where five friends are arguing over whether Greg should marry his pregnant girlfriend, everyone's talking so fast that Greg can't get a word in edgewise.
"He has to," Larry said.
"Says who?" Marge said.
"Come on, maybe they don't want to . . ." Tony said.
"This isn't about what's best for them anymore! There's a kid," Amy said.
"Stop it!" Greg snapped. "I already asked her to get an abortion."
They froze as if waiting for someone to throw themselves on the verbal grenade Greg had lobbed into the center of the table.

How many names did you actually see when you skimmed through the dialog? No. Really. Don't go back and look. In the initial pass through, I'm betting you saw only Greg's. Because the interesting stuff was what was being said, not who said it, much less how it was said.

See, here's the ultimate secret that three years of acting conservatory and WAY too much money spent on tuition taught me.

What people say is action and conflict and emotion. Tags are directions attempting to dictate how the reader should hear or say the words.

In the end, for me, it doesn't matter whether my characters say, whine, hiss, groan, grumble or moan something. I prefer for those directions to be inherent in the words that came out of my characters' mouths. And it is still very much a work in progress.

I Scream, You Scream. Ice Cream?

by Allison Pang

I'm probably the worst person to talk to about dialogue tags. (Or beats, if you want to get technical.) My first drafts are full of them. And not the basic "said" either. No...I've got mutters and murmurs and adviseds, agreeds and snorts. Most of the time it's the equivalent of verbal poo. (And completely allowable on the early drafts.)

But once I've finished a draft, I definitely make it a mission to squash a lot of the extra dialogue tags.  (Though I admit I've got a passing fondness for mutter.)

Since I tend to write most of my books in 1st person, I really try to temper the "I said" thing. Many people who don't like books in 1st have mentioned it's the constant "I did x" or "I went y" that bothers them the most, so I do my best to keep that in check. There's not much point in adding to that total with additional "I said."

However, one thing I rarely do is a simple "he said" type of tag. It's almost always attached to some form of action = "Blah blah blah," he said, throwing the book onto the table.

But even that usually gets pared down later on. "Blah blah blah." He threw the book onto the table.

(Hopefully it would be more dynamic than that, but you get the point. Both work okay, but I think it makes for a cleaner manuscript if there's some variation.)

And then there's adverbs. I know it's bad manners to use adverbs for dialogue tags. It's considered telling over showing - and for the most part, I agree.

"I hate you," he said angrily. 

Meh. That's actually one instance I might choose something else than said - "I hate you," he snapped. But when writing emotions with a lot of punch - anger, passion, sadness...there are so many better ways to display that than just to tell the reader how a character feels.

Crimson flooded his cheeks and he ground his teacup on the table until it shattered. "I hate you."

On the other hand, sometimes adverbs can help give a little nudge into the right mood where you don't need a huge pile of description.

"I know what you mean," he said gently.  vs  "I know what you mean," he said coldly. Each can work depending on the situation. But don't go overboard and describe the tone of *every* sentence either. You can also change it up a little: "I know what you mean," he said, his voice gentle.  (It's probably personal preference as to what works best for you.)

Stay away from crap like:

"I love you," he said lovingly.
 or
"Oh my GOD!" she screamed excitedly.

It's extremely grating to read, on several levels. Otherwise, YMMV.  :)

dialogue tags

by Linda Robertson

Dialogue tags.

I agree with my blogmates that a descriptive action is the best way to identify who is speaking while giving something more to the scene. The action can make the words mean more--especially if they are contrary to the words. A calm voice, reserved tone of voice, and a distracting gesture meant to hide the fact that under the table a character is reaching toward a concealed gun shows us that someone (Han Solo in the cantina with Greedo comes to mind...) is about to take action. For that moment before it happens, we tense up-- 

That all built the character and advanced the story, right? 

But sometimes tags are necessary.

In one of my WIPs, I just had a scene where one character is in a doorway, listening unseen to a conversation three others are having. The POV character wasn't observing them, so actions were out and there were three older males talking. The three were new to the reader, but well known to the listening character. How to make them distinct? I considered an accent to make one of the speakers obvious, but theres no accent in prior use in this not-of-earth tale, so that seemed a disingenuous solution. I considered an impediment. I considered nicknames. It all boiled down to identifiying to the reader who was speaking.

In the end I did use "NAME said" a lot. There was no other way around it. It simply had to be that way.

Sometimes that's the way it is.

But its not an excuse to get lazy. It's a call to action, a challenge. How to make the means of identifying them less necessary, and make it blend in when it is used?  

I gave each character a distinct opinion, a personal motive that could shine through in the words they chose, building their personality for the reader before they get a 'look' at them,

EXCEPRT:

{Asiel} stood in the chapel doorway, listening. It was a two-story room, and he always met with them in the oratory, a small room off from the upper chapel. Though their voices were hushed, they were not quite whispering and their words carried. He paused to listen.
   "Bad timing, this arrival of our formerly heroic king," Nestor said.
   "Indeed," Ysal agreed. His voice was muffled slightly as if he was eating something.
   "You believe it?" Chandlen sounded incredulous.
   "Of course not."
   "I don’t believe it either," Ysal chimed in. "A man simply does not grow younger. Not even a legend like him."
   "Good," Chandlen said. "At least we agree on that."
   "But I do believe," Nestor added, "that it cannot be a coincidence."
   There was silence for a heartbeat, then Chandlen said, "Go on."
   "The priests of Delea used magic until they were all struck dead. But there is a man in the dungeon that we are told is a living, breathing priest of Delea. How? Why? Why now?" He paused. "Aside from a few who can by will light a candle or chill a pitcher of wine, the only magic left in our kingdom resides in the Cenotaph, in the virgins who keep their monumental sepulcher to honor a dead goddess who mothered their revered Iarratana."
   "You’re drawing a connection to the nursemaid?" Chandlen asked.
   "There is that," Nestor said. "We have long suspected that Rivanen’s matrons want to lay claim to Edgewall to have a foothold here in the capitol. Maybe they have grown impatient. But the use of magic means there is another possibility."
   "What?" Ysal asked. "Elves?"
   "Magic renews our hero-king shortly after the boy returns? It is beyond credulity."
   Chandlen pressed, "What are you saying?"
   "I’m saying we must be cautious. We already know the prince is cunning and eager to rule. The sorceress-priestesses could be about to attempt a take-over. Or the elves could be making peace simply to get closer in order to cover their plan of attack."
   "You weary me, Nestor. You see conflict to fear in every deed."
   "And you hand out your trust like a child, Chandlen. Moments ago you were relieved that we agreed this Ghelvok was a fraud."
   "Whether he is a ruse or not is irrelevant. Rumors are spreading even now. If our first king has come back to us, who will oppose him? Will you? Will the people?"
   Asiel was pleased to hear his advisors remained loyal to him, but he kept still, listening.
   Nestor spoke next. "The people will be, and should be, angry that someone tried to take the name of their hero and sully it. We should simply imprison him."
   "We should use him to give the people hope," Chandlen argued.

So, if I did my job in this draft, the dialogue itself means much more to you as a reader, and you came away with a sense of the characters of these old men, as well as having the plot advanced by what they are revealing. 

I think the dialogue itself should be so interesting and revealing that the tags are /almost/ unnecessary.

They Don't See "Said," They Said

Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.

Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.

Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.Said.
 

The word is a bit like nails on slate. For all the research about the dialogue tag "said" being ignored by the brain, I must be one of the outliers on the grid of results. Not only do I notice "said," I have stabby feelings about the overuse of the word. By "overuse," I mean more than once per chapter. Mostly because it's a cop-out by the author. If the character can't possibly do something whilst speaking that allows for the identification of the speaker, they'd better be frozen in carbonite...and then they wouldn't really be speaking, so ... ya know... again, no really good reason to use "said" more than ...rarely.

That is not to say (see what I did there?) I don't love dialogue tags. I do. I particularly love them when the character who is speaking is out of the line of sight of the POV character (where actions cannot be observed, don'cha know).

More than two characters hashing it out in one conversation? Label that shit. One way or another. I don't want to guess who said that to whom. If it's a botox party and expressions are not physically possible, then bring on the tagging. I'd much rather endure an army of "said" than have to re-read snappy quips trying to figure out who's the genius, who's the ijit, and who's the referee.

When will I absolutely use dialogue tags? I'm a big fan of asides while characters are in a crowd, so there's muttering, mumbling, grumbling, growling (particularly for bestial characters).

I'm such a rebel, I'm not ashamed to throw in the occasional adverb into a dialogue tag when the words being spoken are in contrast to the emotion. Sarcasm, one of the harder things to communicate without incessant eye rolls and drolls. 

I admit, there are a few tags to which I have an unhealthy attachment; particularly when I cough up the first draft of a novel. In my current WiP, my protagonist snorted more than a truffle pig. There may have been a side-kick who drawled so much he ought to have seen a doctor about his lack of muscle control.

All-in-all, my go-to for speaker-identification is action amid dialogue. Second-string are the tags that convey emotion. Court of last resort ... "said."

So, dear reader, am I the only one who notices "said" or are a few of you keeping my outlying dot company?

image originally found here: http://theinspiredclassroom.blogspot.com/2011/10/no-more-said.html