In our PC, safety first, world, we're bombarded with words that express what is usually a prohibition on fun, excitement, intrigue and uncertainty in terms that can't be criticised or picked apart by lawyers. Take this, for example, from 'The Dangerous Substances and Preparations (Safety) (Consolidation) Regulations 1994', which come under the heading of Consumer Protection:

"No person shall supply any article which contains more than 1.5 ml of liquid consisting of sulphides or ammonia or a mixture or solution of such sulphides with or in any other substance, being an article which is desgined or intended to afford amusement to any person by causing discomfort to any other person by means of the use or exploitation of the obnoxious properties of such sulphides."

Translation: "stink bombs are fun but they're banned".

It strikes me that an author's job is to reverse this process – to dig out the colour, sensuality, excitement and fun from within the daily bureau-speak we all fall prey to, and stuff it into a great big story-bag that gets the reader's spirit juices flowing once more. Unfortunately, quite a bit of writing on this site falls into bland-speak, too many flat adjectives, too many realistic (i.e. boring) dialogues ... We're all prone to this, of course, because we live in it, but I feel that if a writer wants to make a difference to a reader's life he has to be able to take a crap-kinfe to his own work and slice out all the dead stuff, replace it with words that count. Quite often, a writer has a good story idea but neglects to make every description and every conversation within the story shine - just plunks down a load of words that he hopes will lead eventually to the climax.

I believe this is a matter of full-spirit concentration on every word you commit to paper: is this the best, most concise, most challenging, word I can use here, or am I just hoping to get by?


Terry

An interesting proposition Terry. However, I'm not sure how that principle can be applied to dialogue. One of my favourite bug-bears is unrealistic conversation and I often find myself thinking 'People just don't talk like that!'. Sometimes this is through poor use of exposition in dialogue (Clive Cussler is a fine example in my opinion) but more often than not it's simply too formal and structured.

I have a friend who's a linguist and not surpringsly we frequently discuss the use of language in writing. The other day we were talking about conversation in pubs (an entirely self-referential process as it happens) and found that most such dialogue is simple, frequently carries syntax errors and is often interrupted. This doesn't mean all our friends are illiterate morons (quite the reverse in truth) it simply seems the way that spontaneous dialogue comes out.

When we write dialogue of course we have time to evaluate the words and the sentences, make choices and present the version we're happy with. However, in doing this I think there's a risk that we lose the spontaneity of real speech. Of course it depends upon the genre and the format of the writing. Stage drama, for example, is understandably a step away from 'real' speech for reasons of clarity and drammatic effect but for everyday characters in novels do we really want them all delivering speeches?

This has ended up sounding like I disagree with you and I don't fundamentally. It struck a chord with me because in my youth my writing was accused of being too 'flowery'. Something that has stayed with me ever since.

Jon

I believe that some spontaneity must be sacrificed in order to achieve the purpose of the writing. It would be nice if we could just throw down a collection of words and move the plot onwards, but most of what counts as standard dialogue between real people is dismissable gurgling said merely to pass time and eliminate awkward quiet moments.

Although I'm sure there are those here able to aptly include such things in their writing, I personally believe this can be excluded, and only more essential dialogue included. People saying things that moves things forwards, later traps or redeems them, opens doors or otherwise alters the status quo.

Spontaneity plays very little part in this, and often, to make things work the way I desire, such dialogue must be carefully measured to deliver what it requires, and nothing more or less.

There are extremes, and they seem to work. Some novels have endless reams of dialogue which have almost an absurd excess of words, while there are others in which barely a word is spoken. Neither is by definition better than the other.

I compare it to American and Japanese comics. American comics have almost continuous dialogue, and when not, a running commentary, while Japanese manga can often go for pages at a time without a single word being said or inferred. Different techniques, different tastes, different audiences.

Jon,

You've raised a fundamental issue, I think. I find part of myself agreeing with you, that written dialogue has to contain some of the ordinary, meaningless, self-reverential stuff that real speech has, otherwise it doesn't sound natural. But another part of me - which I think is the writer part - says, Well, that's the challenge: to produce dialogue that sounds natural but is in itself interesting, funny, instructional, whatever. A good example of this, for me at least, is in the dialogue in 'Frasier'. Of course, no one actually speaks like this in real life - with so much humour and wit - but it still sounds natural. Of course, I'm probably kidding myself, and most people don't find this kind of dialogue remotely 'natural' - it's probably a wish-fulfillment on my part, that real life could actually sound like this. And I must confess, too, that I don't like pub-type conversations, find them very boring; dinner party conversations too. I also hate gossip, even though we're told that it's good for us.

Terry

IB,

I agree that spontaneity has to be sacrificed, or at least put on hold, in producing, say, dialogue that - in the case of a good sitcom, for instance - needs to come across to the audience as spontaneous. This is the 'Fred Astaire' syndrome, where fans only see the grace and fluidity and charm. Dancers will see the sweat and (literally) blood and sheer hard work.

But with this thread I think I was trying to get at taking on the bland in oneself. In the process of writing, there is a kind of bland-default setting in our brains, that will automatically come up with the easy, comfortable, expected words. This happens all the time in conversation - if you listen to people talking, you can easily tell what each person is going to say next.

Maybe I'm postulating that good writing is a combination of working hard at finding the best words and then challenging that selection, pushing oneself to find a better, more magical word. When this happens, a kind of spontaneity can appear - one's characters, for instance, if worked hard into authentic people - will start speaking words that surprise and delight the author. Wow, if only it happened more often. And how to get it to happen more often - that, I think, is the Holy Grail for writers.

Terry

Writing good dialogue is a craft in itself and there is no better example, in my opinion, than the playwright David Mamet.

He carves his characters from what they say, not what is said, at the same time driving the plot forward and (seemingly effortlessly) capturing the essence of spontaneous, everyday speech. However - to go back to Terry's point - he chooses each word with extreme care, and none are wasted. He does what every writer should do: create the illusion of the real, the conversational, the spontaneous through mastery of his craft.

I would highly reccomend reading any of his works as examples of just how real dialogue can, and should, sound.

All the best

Harry

Terry, Frasier is an excellent example and it's that kind of dialogue I was alluding to when I mentioned stage drama. If I could write scripts like that I wouldn't be sitting where I am now.

Getting back onto your point about the bland-default setting, I do agree that this is terribly common. I can recall reading many books where the pages fly past but the experience is ultimately unsatisfying. A bit like eating a big bowl of plain rice; filling but not much fun.

Jon

Jon,

The best US sitcoms tend to be written by challenge. First, the author for a particular episode has the challenge of writing-up to what are often well-established characters and a high standard of writing. Then his or her script is challenged by the other writers in the team, the producers, directors, other actors and sometimes even the audience. If a line isn't funny, then it's re-written until it is. Recently, I watched a MASH reunion on TV and at one point was struck by one of the producers saying that they wanted a one-off character for one episode and knew of a writer who was good at that kind of character. So they brought him in, just for that one character.

What I'm trying to do in my own writing process, is to somehow get my head stuffed with a range of challenging critics who will not let me off the bland hook, so to speak. Well, that and to get actual, outside my head, critics to look at the work when it's finished, of course.

Terry