I don't know about simplifies, as that would suggest children's writing is simplified, but it just reminds of the narration from children's books. Adult: "You owe me money," John said. Children's: "I like red balloons best!" said John.
I use a combo of both. Just my preference. I don't think there's a right or wrong way to do it? All depends on your style I suppose. Checked George RR Martin and he's a combo user too.
It probably becomes more noticeable when you resort to third person pronouns. 'I'll have you hanged at assizes' said he. Now it's starting to sound old fashioned!
I almost never use third person pronouns with dialogue tags. That implies the dialogue follows an action beat, in which case I would just omit the tag entirely. Rather than: John picked up the phone. "Hello," he said. You can just do: John picked up the phone. "Hello." Generally, it's obvious who's speaking.
It would surely depend on context. I don't think you can do away with dialogue tags entirely - and I'm not sure by what measure reducing clarity guarantees a more engaging experience. Take this brief excerpt from 'An Encounter' by Joyce. See, we get to encounter the strange man's dialogue here - and in stead of having him drone on and on, Joyce manages to reveal more of what he is trying to convey in the preceding sentence. Another one illustrates its effect on clarity, from 'Ivy Day in the Committee Room' That last passage is written in such a way as to convey the rapidity of the conversation. In such cases, dialogue tags help the reader keep track of the conversation while giving the desired effect. It's almost silly at this point - we get 'said I, I said, said I' three times in a row, but I get the impression here that it punctuates the dialogue to make us imagine the narrator is taking breaths between his speech. Admittedly, Joyce was seminal in modernism within literature so these techniques might have been a bit radical for his day. Nonetheless I could go on and on with others works where dialogue tags are used and the matter of syntax could be discussed, but I think it illustrates the point here that it is not always obvious who is speaking and that dialogue tags don't necessarily disrupt the flow of dialogue - and can even have an interesting effect. One more for the road. Nice little hint at Corley's character, freed up by the use of third person pronoun in the dialogue tag.
It all has to with SVO order. Subject-Verb-Object is the English default. When dialog comes in, everything gets turned around. The quote is the object because it's what is being said. "Yer a wizard, Harry," Hagrid said. (OSV order) "Yer a wizard, Harry," said Hagrid. (OVS order) Since both choices are outside of the norm, there's no "correct" one. Brits seem more likely to use the second (more likely, not very likely). American English favors the first. But genre changes things too. Don't forget, you have these options too! Hagrid said, "Yer a wizard, Harry." (SVO order) Said Hagrid, "Yer a wizard, Harry." (VSO order) And then there's a clear preference, because the first choice matches the SVO default. I haven't heard anyone mention this . . . but pronouns change things too. Even the most dyed in the wool "said-X" sort will avoid: "Yer a wizard, Harry," said he. (OVS order) And because pronouns show up an awful lot, the "X-said" pattern gets followed even more. That's why no one uses "said-X" for everything. There's also the issue of getting the verb close to the subject. (If you want to break a sentence, one of the easiest ways to do it is to let the two be separated by long phrases.) "Yer a wizard, Harry," the chemist with the sunken eyes, neat goatee, and black pork pie cap pulled low over his brow said. "Yer a wizard, Harry," said the chemist with the sunken eyes, neat goatee, and black pork pie cap pulled low over his brow. So in that case, OVS "said-X" wins the day easily. It lets your phrases connect tighter.
do it which ever way you want but for the love of god and tiny fluffy kittens pick ONE and be consistent.
Usually I write "said Bob," but if I swap it for a more descriptive word (pretty much any word other than "said") and I write "Bob muttered." I don't know why, it just feels right to me. Probably because descriptive words can usually stand alone. You can have someone laugh and then speak, or you can have them laugh as they speak, but it wouldn't be grammatically correct in the first instance to write, Laughed John. "No, of course not!" So if I were to have John say something while laughing, I would put his name first because that sounds better to me. This personal rule applies to the word "replied" even though John replied. "I don't think so," is not any more grammatically correct than Replied John. "I don't think so."
I have a limited attention span, so when I occasionally need a tag I’ve followed Stephen King’s advice on ‘he said/she said’ and moved on. https://skysairyou.wordpress.com/2013/05/18/he-said-she-said-stephen-kings-advice-on-dialogue-tags/
For me, it's all a matter of cadence and ear. If it sounds right to do something one way, do it. If it doesn't sound right, do it the other way. In this way, you develop a style of storytelling that's distinctive, instead of doing a thing exactly the same way every time.
I find adding 'said' to anything to be redundant when what is spoken is in " " to begin with. Either leave it out entirely, add action or gesture, or tone/ inflection or facial expression if you must tag dialog. Said seems to be a filler word that only aids in adding to overall word count and that is about it. That is my opinion on the matter. Do as you like.
I agree to an extent but ‘said’ does serve a purpose, particularly when there’s more than two involved in a dialogue. In those cases ‘said’ is used to identify who’s speaking.
i honestly going back and forth between the 2 depending on the narrator style. as i swap between 3rd person and first person depending on the situation alot
