oh, and to the original question, a good first person perspective presents direct observations, not merely the conclusions drawn by the character. So she might state that Drew reached out and briefly touched Paolina's cheek, and that she smiled in return before turning away, that's much more revealing than anything the narrator could say about the beginnings of a change in their relationship. There's nothing inherent in the choice of person or tense to the balance between showing and telling.
It's a time skip. You can skip time in first person present tense, just as you can in any other POV or tense. You wouldn't argue that "I have dinner" is fortune-telling, right? You don't have to write, " I pick up my fork. I stab a piece of broccoli. I bring it toward my mouth. It reaches my mouth..." Present tense doesn't forbid summarizing or time skips.
The best description I've ever read regarding the difference between showing and telling was in (yeah, you know I'm gonna say it) Dwight V. Swain's Techniques of the Selling Writer. Scenes—blow by blow of what's happening—are for showing. And Sequels—weighing options, making decisions, reviewing past events that have a bearing on the current predicament—are for telling. Time dilation (summarizing) is part of the Sequel... but it's also possible to throw in a short bit of summarizing in a Scene (although technically this is a mini-sequel and should finish up quickly so as not to distract from the forward momentum of the Scene).
I think telling is contrasted to showing. Telling is telling the reader what to think rather than letting the reader figure it out. Most of the time, showing is regarded as 'superior'. Usually, it is superior. Charlie told her, "Your dog died". She turned and walked away. She made her way to the wharf, though she could not remember whether she got there by bus, train or foot. She walked along the wharf most of the night, crying. That's pretty much showing, vs telling: "She was devastated and fell apart when her dog died". If I wanted to summarize, and still 'show', I could. For three weeks, she walked the beach, crying, as she had that first night. That first week, Charlie told her that he was worried about her. She told him to shut up. The second week, Charlie told her she should get another dog. She told him to shut up. The third and last week, Charlie shouted loudly that she should see a counselor. She told him to shut up. Finally, Charlie left, saying he would come back when she grew up. As Charlie opened the door and turned to say his last words to her, she threw the dog's dinner dish at his head and shouted, "Don't ever come back". He slammed the door shut. It was the last time he saw her. Some people have 'very telly showing', for example, having another character say, ''She was devastated by the loss of her dog'', rather than describing the girl walking the beach, night after night. Why is showing regarded as 'superior'? Probably because in so many writing situations, it is superior. If one tells the readers what to think, eventually they rebel, or they simply don't feel it deeply enough to stay with you through the next long hike. One might use the device of having another character say ''she was devastated by the loss of her dog", but it might not serve much of a point to the story. It might be more to the point of the story if someone else said, "Good lord, such a lot of fuss over a little dog", or "She's nuts to lose her job over a dog", IF it's important to know such things. IF we don't already know it. I think trouble comes when a writer has only one way he can go, and it's always telling. There are just too many cases where telling doesn't cut it.
Well that's an interesting question. I would use 'showing' with a character who is analytical, methodical and logical in making conclusions and decisions. I'd use 'telling' with a character who had few coping mechanisms and a limited understanding of the world, or was in the midst of an emotional crisis. The doctor walked slowly to the door. He turned to Henry, counting to three, so he turned slowly. "Henry, do you feel like hurting someone right now?" the doctor asked. Henry's face twisted into a grimace. His eyes darted from side to side, rapidly. "Only if the sons of bitches provoke me, then God help them", said Henry, loudly, staring directly at the doctor without blinking. "What would be provoking, Henry?" asked the doctor, keeping his voice level and soft. "They would say hello", Henry said, laughing briefly. The doctor decided. He reached behind his back and gently touched the emergency buzzer by the door. vs telling for the person who is in an emotional crisis, who has few coping mechanisms, limited understanding - He hated them. He hated them all. Every last one of them, forever and ever. They were all liars, bastards, cheats. All they wanted was to cheat him. They were all against him. They always had been, right from the start. Mary wasn't really his friend. She tried to get him to come back home. She didn't even listen to what was going on. Liars, betrayers, cheats, all of them. Too, a day later, the person may have a completely different idea. He didn't really hate Mary. She was okay. He just needed time to explain it to her. Then she'd understand. In the story I'm working on now, the main character changes from being impulsive, emotional and irrational, after years of abuse and victimization culminates in a beating that nearly kills him.
I still think the best explanation of what is show and what is tell I've read is from one of our own members: What show is....
I agree. I feel like the description by Swain is speaking to a larger structural element in the framework of a story or novel. When I think of show and tell, these are - to me - smaller structural elements of syntax, not larger elements of story structure.
Yeah, I actually said that too but then Bayview pointed out that you still need to know the point of the sentence before you can decide whether you're looking at the evidence or the conclusion. Main Character couldn't sleep. If the point of the sentence is "Main Character couldn't sleep," then you would need some kind of evidence to back it up: 2:30 in the morning. Felt like just a minute ago the clock was saying midnight. But if the point is that Main Character is depressed about something, then "Main Character couldn't sleep" could very well be all the evidence you need. EDIT: unless you're going to go all Inception by saying that we need "2:30 in the morning. Felt like just a minute ago the clock was saying midnight" to be the evidence that shows the evidence that shows that Main Character is depressed
Because for me, show versus tell is demonstrate/explain. And you can do either one in either of the modes that you describe. (If this doesn't make sense, ask again and I'll expand when I'm on a keyboard rather than a phone.)
How would I do either one in the modes I describe? I thought they were mutually exclusive. Part of our problem, or rather my problem, is I don't see show or tell the same way you do, not exactly. I don't see it as demonstrate vs explain. I see it as either showing the reader so he can draw his own conclusions, or telling him what conclusion to draw. 'He' referring to any gender and used for brevity only.
Well, as was fist pointed out by @BayView, this is the primordial issue with this question: There is little agreement on the meaning of the two terms and what they mean together as a paradigm. I am personally with @ChickenFreak as regards her take on the matter and as I quoted from @Tea@3. Show is evidence of the thing in question. Tell is delineation of it, flatly put. In the example proffered by @Sack-a-Doo!, Swain seems to be talking about a much larger structure than the mere syntax of a sentence, which the rest of us seem to be engaging. Not much agreement. I will say that your definition varies from mine only in a pedantic manner. I can see the logic of what you are saying, but when I show, I don't do it in such a way that the reader can draw incorrect conclusions, which would seem to be intimated by your definition. Not sure if you mean this as part of the overall dynamic you are trying to impart, but it seems to be there. I could be wrong.
I also proffer the heretical idea that not everything we write answers to this paradigm at all because not everything has a counterpart way in which to express it that would make any reasonable sense. If my character is pondering the murder she just committed and she's looking through a chainlink fence at a parking lot on the other side and notices that the cars are of various models and colors, but this doesn't really have any relevance to showing something else (the murder did not take place in a car, has nothing to do with cars) and she's merely standing there, smoking a cig, contemplating her next move, I guess my description of what she sees is technically tell, but I can think of no show counterpart to that description that would make any rational sense in this moment of telling the story. This - to me - is a thing that really answers to no part of the show & tell paradigm.
That was me that wrote that. I think the basic idea of show is the elaborate pretense that there is no 'correct interpretation', the reader will conclude what he will conclude, shrug, shrug, but of course, one shows what one hopes leads to the desired interpretation. The first time I tried to write a pure-as-the-driven-snow 'show' was in response to a college professor of creative writing, who wrote a novel that started something like, these big dumb kids would do anything to get out of West Virginia, even play college football. He thought that was an absolute riot. He read that and then rolled around in his chair for a full five minutes, slapping his knees. The entire class just stared at him.
It seems that what your instructor was guilty of was a deployment of show that used an "empty file" reference. There was nothing with which the students could connect the dots to the meaning. Perhaps in his own mind the meaning was clear because of some strongly held opinion on either West Virginia or college football, but clearly the connection was opaque. This seems to have much less to do with the validity of the show paradigm and more to do with his poor execution of it.
I apologize, the first sentence of his novel wasn't used by him as an example of 'showing'. I just included it because I thought it was hysterical and an example of how off in his own world he was. He wrote an equally painful spy novel. But I think you hit the target beautifully: the novel was written for a select small group that would 'get' the jokes and references. It really was an empty file reference.
Sure, but you can do either of those things in either scene or summary. I've often seen scenes where the writer explains the meaning and background of every word and facial expression. And a summary can easily "show" something without explaining it.
