Introduction to crafting dialogue
You’ve blended your dialogue and narrative together in the perfect balance. And a beta reader, an editor, or an agent (or worse still, a reviewer) says, “The dialogue feels forced, stilted, not very realistic.”
What does that mean? And how do you address it?
We have a couple of weeks to cover some techniques to address this issue, but I have one primary piece of writing advice when it comes to dialogue: let your characters speak.
Let your characters speak
Do you let your characters speak and then write down what they say? Or do you write a screenplay of dialogue and then force your characters to read the lines exactly as you’ve written it?
You might say, “Of course, I write the lines for my characters.” After all, you’re the writer.
If you’re writing a novel, the characters are fictional—these are not real people. These are characters you’ve created in your mind, you are the author-god, and they don’t say anything other than what you write, right?
There is a fine line between being a writer and insanity. It’s about having those fictional characters tell you what to write. Listen to them talk and write down what they say. Get to know them as intimately as you know a best friend or yourself—they are you, after all.
The sanity you retain is the control. Don’t try to control what your characters say, but control what actually goes into the story. Step away from being the writer, and just be your characters’ editor.
When your characters force you against your will to put things in the final story that you don’t want there and that as the writer you know don’t belong in the story, that might be the time to consult a professional—either an editor or medical attention.
Imagine your characters in the scene, knowing your characters the way you do, but let go of the control.
Listen to what the characters say in those circumstances. Let them talk the way they would naturally speak. Listen and observe. Write it down.
Your characters will surprise you. If you’re writing what they say, what you hear them say in your head, their words will be more natural and realistic.
If you write down what you want the character to say to accomplish a specific point, then the character reads your lines, it can sound forced.
Writing about the character or through the character
If you’re writing in third-person, you’re writing about the character rather than through the character, and there is a natural distance. If there’s distance between author and character, the gap between character and reader will be even greater.
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