{"id":128,"date":"2012-02-24T09:49:00","date_gmt":"2012-02-24T09:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grahamdinton.com\/wp\/?p=128"},"modified":"2012-02-24T06:25:47","modified_gmt":"2012-02-24T06:25:47","slug":"the-purpose-of-dialogue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/grahamdinton.com\/wp\/?p=128","title":{"rendered":"The purpose of Dialogue"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019ve been studying dialogue. There are certain techniques that really help that I will explore over the next couple of blogs. Just to recap, Friday is all about writing skills and the Tuesday posts are short-stories derived from popular song lyrics.<\/p>\n<p>So, this Friday and for the next couple of Fridays(I think), I will focus on dialogue as it relates to short-stories and novels. These comments stem from a whole host of Internet sites and blogs on the subject and also a fantastic book that I recommend called \u2018<a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself\/dp\/0060545690\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1330012394&amp;sr=8-1\">Self-Editing for Fiction Writers<\/a>\u2019 by Renni Browne and Dave King. There are many useful chapters in this book that I will recap in future blogs.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 18pt; color: #0e58a8;\">What is the the purpose of dialogue?<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Every piece of dialogue you include should be there for a reason:<\/p>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: disc;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #0e58a8;\">To break up the narrative<\/span> \u2014 you can use dialogue to balance out the other elements of fiction such as the description.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: disc;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #0e58a8;\">To advance the plot<\/span> \u2014 character discussions can ultimately change the course of the plot, and this is a very effective way of showing that change.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: disc;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #0e58a8;\">To develop conflict<\/span> \u2014 arguing characters creates conflict and dialogue can build the tension.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: disc;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #0e58a8;\">To present information<\/span> \u2014 dialogue can be used as an alternative way to present the necessary facts.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: disc;\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #0e58a8;\">To develop character<\/span> \u2014 Dialogue can reveal the personality, age, intelligence and experience of a character.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/grahamdinton.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/wpid-57167e6sgntua92-2012-02-24-09-49.jpg\" alt=\"wpid-57167e6sgntua92-2012-02-24-09-49.jpg\" width=\"400\" height=\"266\" \/><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 9pt;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.freedigitalphotos.net\/images\/view_photog.php?photogid=2280&lt;br \/&gt;\n\">http:\/\/www.freedigitalphotos.net\/images\/view_photog.php?photogid=2280<br \/>\n<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Showing the development of a character is one of the more important aspects of dialogue. Rather than simply telling the reader that a character has changed and is, for example, no longer shy, it is more effective to write a piece of dialogue in a scene where that character demonstrates that he\/she has overcome the shyness, perhaps by approaching a complete stranger.<\/p>\n<p>Dialogue is a very effective way to convey personality, and it is important to think through the ways in which a person of that personality will speak or present himself\/herself to an audience. Is he timid? Is she assertive? Critical? Kind? Irritated? Passive? Well educated?<\/p>\n<p>I find that the first few interactions of a new character really set the scene for how that person will behave throughout the story. So it is important to start right, and I usually spend a little while experimenting with the character before placing them in the scene proper. I might write a short piece where the character is interviewed with a set of questions about his\/her life and likes\/dislikes. The way in which the character answers helps to get me in the way of thinking for that character.<\/p>\n<p>There are many blogs and websites out there that help you to think through different behaviour patterns and characteristics and I will add a small compendium of them to this blog at some point soon.<\/p>\n<p>Some rules about dialogue. (Of course, when I say rule\u2026all rules are there to be broken\u2026perhaps guidelines would be more appropriate.)<\/p>\n<ul style=\"list-style-type: disc;\">\n<li>Take out the superfluous conversations and summarise to one sentence. We don\u2019t want ramblings about the weather or what the person had for breakfast. (they can use twitter for that!).<\/li>\n<li>Be consistent. We all repeat ourselves, or use slang in certain ways. It adds authenticity to add that to a character.<\/li>\n<li>Generally people talk in short sentences. Save the literary expositions for the narrative.<\/li>\n<li>Be more articulate on the page than would normally be said in a certain situation &#8211; use a bigger vocabulary than the person might have.<\/li>\n<li>Be VERY sparing about using action as a dialogue tag &#8211; it can work occasionally but not too often.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I\u2019ll blog next week with more rules about the mechanics of dialogue. Hope this is useful &#8211; it is to me!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019ve been studying dialogue. There are certain techniques that really help that I will explore over the next couple of blogs. Just to recap, Friday is all about writing skills and the Tuesday posts are short-stories derived from popular song lyrics. So, this Friday and for the next couple of Fridays(I think), I will focus [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-skill"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The purpose of Dialogue - 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