My characters talk too much. Or, more accurately, I've let the bits of dialog go on longer than I like, but now I'm finding it hard to trim it back. I can tell this is a problem for the specific story I'm working on, but I'm not sure how to fix it. It's not like my story is mostly dialog or anything like that. It's more the bouts of dialog seem too long for my liking. I'm usually not a dialog-heavy writer. I don't know what happened to me this time. But my damn characters are going to ruin my story if they don't shut up. Does anyone have advice on trimming down dialog in a major way? I don't want to lose any of the story, but I know I'm better at telling this story than my characters, I think. I'm not sure what happened this time around. The dialog isn't bad. I just think it's too much. I'm not even sure why I think this other than I typically don't use this much dialog. How do you know if you have too much dialog? And how do you know if it's working for your story of not? I guess that's what it comes down to, if it is working for the story or not. I'm just feeling really frustrated with this right now.
I can think of two ways to cut out dialogue. One involves using action instead of dialogue at times. This will probably only replace a little bit of dialogue, and will only work in specific kinds of scenarios. I mean things like: As mom droned on, Shirley turned to Betsy and circled a forefinger around her temple a few times while crossing her eyes. Betsy almost laughed out loud. The other is to indirectly report what was said in a conversation. Something like: They talked well into the night, about road trips and football games and long drowsy afternoons spent fishing. Charley seemed to be getting lost in memories, reliving them through conversation, while Roseanne took a more clinical attitude toward it all.
I find it hard to identify with the OP but I guess some points to check might be:- - is dialogue being used for exposition? (I think it should be avoided) - have the characters, their voices, and their motives been sufficiently established before the dialogue starts? - is the reader being credited with enough ability to follow the unspoken, as well as the spoken? (this is partly if the characters are established enough, but also very much in the execution) - - if things can be left unsaid, dialogues may get shorter - does the dialogue have clear objectives, and is it going outside them? - would one large dialogue work better as several smaller ones? - would a reported dialogue work better? - are the characters at work? (such that protocol and bumfodder intrudes on the dialogue) - if there's just naturally a lot of dialogue, consider cutting everything else and writing a play instead
Thanks for the checklist. This is actually quite helpful to kind of rundown these and go though my story again. Thank you.
Bit less considered and structural than the above… Know where they are, what time pressures they are under, and have that in mind when you write it. That will give at least one of the characters reason to hasten the conversation to a conclusion. This even works when there is no obvious hard deadline ("I got to get that train!"). Such as, in a bar, two men talking at the bar, but one of them knows he should text his wife. Now he is initially interested in the other guy but the moment it starts to go on some he's getting twitchy, so draws it to close.
The best way to approach this problem is to probably see if there are other ways. Is there a way to convey the information you want to convey through use of the setting? One of the most popular ways to do this is using "calling cards." You might have a character, for example, who is constantly playing with a deck of cards. In a later scene, someone might find a card just lying there. And if you're doing it right, this calling card could only be there if that specific character had left it there and had some kind of influence.
