How to write dialogue
People often struggle with writing dialogue. They find it hard to make it realistic on the page. Here are a few ideas of things to practice, which might help:
· Listen to people around you, people you talk to on the phone, or characters in films or on television dramas. Speech and conversations on the tv will be sharper and briefer than anything in real life. So pay attention to the different ways people say things, then watch tv to learn how to reveal story and character through dialogue. Practice on the page. Cut back any extra words, keep it short and sharp.
· Use dialogue to reveal character. List all the ways you can think of to say ‘hello’ or ‘goodbye’ or ‘how are you?’ or ‘time for a cup of tea’. Then write down the particular ways your characters say common words or phrases. Where do they come from? Does this affect how they talk? Do they talk differently to their neighbour or to their boss?
These background notes are from Julie Corbin’s novel in progress:
Three mothers and their children are sitting at the table, ready to eat. What does each of the women say?
Character A -‘Just try it, darling. If you don’t like it, we’ll give it to the chickens.’
Character B – ‘There’s no point in me cooking if you’re not going to eat it!’
‘You didn’t cook it!’ Aleri shouted back. ‘You heated it up. That’s different.’
Character C – ‘Let’s have some carrot sticks with the humus Daddy made.’
‘I don’t like carrots,’ Lily said.
‘Of course you do.’ She smiled. ‘Everyone likes carrots.’
· What people say isn’t always what people mean. Think about the subtext in a conversation. Are the characters covering something up? Are they telling a white lie? Do they have a secret that is about to come out? How do they answer a direct question? This offers readers lots of suspense, intrigue and an upper hand over the characters in the story.
· Follow a standard style when punctuating dialogue. It will make it easier to read and look professional too. Pick up any novel to see how the dialogue is laid out. You’ll find a new line for each new character speaking, single quotation marks (British), and simple speech tags such as ‘he said’ or ‘she said’. If you’re interested in finding out more about laying out dialogue, try this article by Louise Harnby.