I love dialogue. I love writing it. I love reading it. I love listening to it whether it’s in my classroom, the hallway, on TV, or walking down the streets of NYC. I love the words, the slang, the phrases, the rhythm, the cadence, the whole hidden conversations in our conversations.
I love the variety of purposes dialogue can serve from exploring characterization to describing scenes and characters to giving us information to further the story. And when I write, I always write the dialogue first. If I can’t hear the dialogue in a scene, I can’t write anything else until I can.
Roz over at Nail Your Novel has a great post here on dialogue. Check it out and tell me: How do you feel about dialogue as an element of your story? How do you use it? Do you eavesdrop on people around you? Is it easy for you to hear when you write?
I love writing witty banter. My problem is that this can go on for pages, so then I have to figure out what to keep and what to trim out :-)
ReplyDeleteI'm working with my dialogue because I think it's weak, and when that happens I lose a lot of my confidence so thank you so much for the linkage! I hope to grab some very helpful tips!
ReplyDeleteWow girl you are quickly on your way to the top with almost 200 followers! GO YOU!
I definitely think of certain key sentences that each character needs to say in a scene and then work around it.
ReplyDeleteDialogue is the strongest element in any of my writing. I'm like you, I can't write anything unless the dialogue is down first. As a matter of fact, that's how I start all my books, with dialogue. Nice post Sarah Jayne.
ReplyDeleteIt depends on the dialoge. There are times when I love it because I get to be witty or sarcastic or mean. But I'm not crazy about it when it's sad or putting together plot puzzle pieces.
ReplyDelete~JD
I think I'm getting a handle on dialogue. Not to say I'm the best at it, or anything, but I really have a feel for my characters. I know how they sound, their verbal tics. I do love writing dialogue--it's the one place where the word count flies away without me even noticing.
ReplyDeleteOoooo . . . I definitely have problems with dialogue sometimes. Most times, actually. Sometimes it just comes to me, but I've found that I end up having the characters talking about the same things over and over, which is no good. I decided recently that I need to spend more time listening to people interact in hopes that I can do better with it. BUT, I did have good feedback from the MWA contest about my dialogue, so maybe I'm overthinking it:)
ReplyDeleteLike you, dialogue is my favorite and the easiest for me. (plotting, um, not easy)
ReplyDeleteBut, I swear, the dialogue comes direct from my characters. They're like a movie in my head and I'm just the recording vessel.
I go back in later and fill out the research, transitions and details, but the dialogue scenes all go down in my first draft.
This reminds me of an old Everybody Loves Raymond episode--it's not always about the can opener. In other words, what people are talking about isn't actually what they're talking about. I think that's what can make dialog difficult. It's a representation of speaking, not actual speaking, and sometimes I think we forget that.
ReplyDeleteFor me, dialog is probably the easiest part of writing a story. It's all that description and structure that bogs me down.
Dialog is my strong point. Should I confess that I have had imaginary conversations in my head for as long as I can remember? I do enjoy listening in on occasion . . . though it feels a little sneaky.
ReplyDeleteI'm just learning how to write dialogue now...and trying to make sure my characters don't sound just like me.
ReplyDeleteI love how dialogue can distinguish characters from each other by the way they say things.
ReplyDeletei love love love love LOVE writing dialogue.
ReplyDeletealso, i love it.
Dialogue is my favorite part of writing, my favorite way to make a character real and let the reader know who he/she really is. And I don't eavesdrop nearly as much as I should, though now that my kids are getting to be teens, and I write YA, it will be easier to listen in. :)
ReplyDeleteI've never really had a problem with dialogue. I just listen to what my characters say during a particular scene:) Description is what I really need to work on.
ReplyDeleteSJ--I'm with you: dialogue sure is a ton of fun. And Roz's pointers are right on target. Thanks for sharing it.
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