Seriously this is some strange elixer recipe to me. I feel there are times where I'm overly reliant on dialogue to convey portions of the narrative, while there are other where I rely on exposition. There's that "show don't tell" rule, but honestly, sometimes it doesn't work. Sometimes you have an exchange of information for the reader to know there was an exchange of information. You can't just... Toss that in there. (There are other examples surely I could come up with) I feel this may actually be the greatest weakness in my writing, does anyone have general guidelines I might be able to use?
I think the general consensus is that the "show don't tell" rule is, at best, an oversimplification. Of course there are times to "tell". And I would argue that it's very rarely a good idea to "tell" through dialogue - that just leads to awkward, unnatural dialogue. If something's important to your story--like, is the MAIN thing you want readers to pull out of the scene--I think it's generally best to "show" that. And dialogue is one of the useful tools for showing. But if something is not that important, maybe it should just be "told", and I don't think dialogue is usually the best choice for that. So it all kind of comes down to the author having a clear idea of what the scene is FOR. Why is it included, what needs to be achieved in it, what does the reader need to learn? I think if the author knows that stuff it's much easier to make other decisions about the scene.
Personally, I hate dialogue that exists solely for the purpose of exposition. This can include the dreaded "As you know, Bob," but I also tend to cringe at the gimmicks writers come up with to do exposition in dialogue. Like I'm reading a book right now that just had a scene with a storyteller, as a way of explaining the world's history. In theory it could work, but the storyteller wasn't very engaging, and I felt like the information that took several pages to convey could have been neatly summarized in a paragraph if the author'd had the guts to tell instead of show. Doesn't mean I always hate exposition in dialogue. I just feel that the dialogue should be serving some other purpose at the same time. Or at least pack a lot of conflict in there. You know, something to give it some spark. One of my favorite fantasy novels has a scene where some schoolgirls are reciting important pieces of their world's history, but despite the obvious framing device it sucked me in anyway because it was a creepy cult-like school and their teacher (who was a little unhinged) started going off about it. It was wild. Anyway. I think the most important thing is that however you choose to do your exposition, you need to either make it brief or you need to make it compelling, if not both.
This would be my main advice. I've heard that people will tend to glaze over long paragraphs to tune into whatever's in quotation marks, then maybe go back and read the narrative paragraphs, and I've caught myself doing that as well. For some reason our brains just like to prioritize dialogue in reading, so I try to put the important stuff in the dialogue when that's an option. Also, of course, if say you have one character just learning about a situation that the reader is already familiar with, you're going to want to summarize that rather than 'show' other characters getting them up to speed, to avoid repetition ("Jodie hurriedly told him what had been going on and ..."). Stuff like that. I think the important thing thing about dialogue is considering whether or not it's stuff that people would actually say. You want it to come across as genuine, to sound real. If the exposition doesn't sound legit in dialogue, it shouldn't be in the dialogue.
I realize I'm going off on a tangent, but I tend to prefer to stuff these sorts of summaries inside "scene". That is, for example: Fred put his hands on Jodie's shoulders and encouraged her firmly into her seat. "Time to explain, kid." Jodie protested, "I didn't get my fries!" A sigh. "Howard, go get her some fries." She smiled at Howard. "And a shake." Fred waved a hand. "Fine. And a shake. Start explaining." Two orders of fries, one shake, and half a plate of onion rings later, both men were staring at her, dumbfounded. Fred said, "You killed all of them?" "Yep." Jodie cheerfully reached to take his Diet Coke. "Don't worry, none of them had families."
Yeah, I think that'd kind of be the middle ground between my example snippet and a full in-text recap, and there's definitely a place for that. I actually think you could even work in an entire retelling of events, too, if you made it entertaining rather than just a straightforward recap. It just has to fit your tone and pacing.
I distracted myself. I was going to say that there's dialogue, there's exposition, and there's also character thought--whether literal thought or otherwise. I'm not sure if "exposition" includes character thought, but I see them as different things. Examples of my definitions, right or wrong: Exposition: On the bureau was a vase of Fire and Ice roses from the florist downstairs, a gift that had cost James a good half of his paycheck. Jane had received them with delighted appreciation, before promptly departing for an evening out. Character thought: And the flowers. The damned flowers, a dozen roses that had cost half his paycheck and didn't have the decency to be properly red; they looked like someone had spilled bleach on them. Oh, sure, Jane acted like she liked them, but where was she now? Probably out with that pencil-pushing accountant.
Nitpick: I've always felt that information conveyed through dialogue is as much exposition as is information conveyed through narration The rule for which being that there are two or three components to any exposition The information being conveyed The person (either a POV character or an omniscient narrator) conveying the information And, if the information is being conveyed via dialogue – instead of through narration and/or internal monologue – then The person receiving the information What is it about a particular event happening that makes that particular piece of information relevant? What is the POV character trying to do with that information? Why is the POV character trying to do that? How does the POV character feel differently about the information than how another character would feel about the same information in the same situation? What is it about the POV character that makes them feel this way about the information?
This is an important point. I think sometimes people make the mistake of thinking dialogue = showing while narration = telling, and that's a very flawed way of thinking about it. Dialogue can easily be lots of telling, and narration can of course have lots of showing. What's important to consider is which you need for the particular scenario (to show or to tell), and whether it could believably be spoken about in the context (especially to avoid any infodumping or "as you know..." situations).
Thanks a bunch, this is really clarifying, but I feel like one of my main flaws is that I find that through dialogue plot holes and such could be cleared up. Otherwise, certain things don't make sense to the reader, or they might find plot holes that aren't actually there because they missed details in an exchange of information, or a perception of the receiving end of it. Do you think there would be ways to do this within exposition/narration? (I'm probably going to be torn a new one but narration and exposition are largely the same to me except the latter is a more personal twist on raw elements at play, I rarely use exposition by itself because of the "show don't tell" rule)
I really liked that example you put, I always felt uncomfortable sliding in those "catch up" paragraphs but this is a great way to do it. For me though, dialogue never really comes off as info dumpy, or forced, my main worry is that it may be a bit more dialogue that I think most could handle, or rather, dialogue conveys information in such a way where the reader overlooks key points. (I could be wrong, but for me, I find that most overlooked things said in conversation, contrary to what some others have been saying) Which is interesting. Though I would say my dialogue is split with narration in 50/50, I may just be nit picking at this point, but having more balanced exposition never hurts, it grounds the reader, and sometimes I think dialogue "ungrounds" them from the setting if it goes on for too long, even with bits of detail slid in between.
I really liked that example you stated, I always felt uncomfortable sliding in those "catch up" paragraphs but this is a great way to do it. For me though, dialogue never really comes off as info dumpy, or forced, my main worry is that it may be a bit more dialogue that I think most could handle, or rather, dialogue conveys information in such a way where the reader overlooks key points. (I could be wrong, but for me, I find that most overlooked things said in conversation, contrary to what some others have been saying) Which is interesting. Though I would say my dialogue is split with narration in 50/50, I may just be nit picking at this point, but having more balanced exposition never hurts, it grounds the reader, and sometimes I think dialogue "ungrounds" them from the setting if it goes on for too long, even with bits of detail slid in between.
This has me curious, but I don't "get" the concept--that is, I don't see why dialogue would be uniquely useful for this. Could you offer an example or two?
There's another scenario you could use to convey information via dialogue. Think about real life. How many times do you ask somebody 'What happened?' And then they tell you. You might interrupt them on several points, ask questions, etc. However, they ARE 'telling' you what happened (through their perspective, of course.) This approach can feel very natural when written into a story, and isn't the "As you know, Bob..." thing at all. You can also get bags of character thrown in as a bonus. Just make sure the person speaking uses his or her own character's voice ...and if that voice is dull, don't let them go on and on. Conversational interruptions can serve to emphasize/underscore important points as well. "...and then James opened the window and threw the book out," "What? Why did he do that? It was his mother's favourite book!" "I guess he wasn't as fond of his mother as we thought." That little exchange will have a stronger impact (and be more likely to be remembered later on) than if the narrating character merely said "James threw his mother's favourite book out the window." All sorts of tricks to this writing game.
