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Meg Waite Clayton

Author of the international bestsellers The Postmistress of Paris, The Last Train to London, and 6 other novels

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February 16, 2013 By Meg Waite Clayton

10 Suggestions for Writing Dialogue

I did a panel on writing dialogue at the San Francisco Writers’ Conference yesterday, and ran out of the handouts I brought. So for those of you who asked for a copy afterward, and anyone else who is interested:

Meg’s Top 10 Suggestions for Writing Dialogue:

  1. Keep it brief. (How brief? See the Edith Wharton quote below.)Journal Avatar to Link Back to Blog Hop
  2. Engage the reader and move the story forward.
  3. Write real life speech, but with the boring parts removed.
  4. Reveal relationships rather than describing them: through conflict, emotion, attitude, subtext.
  5. Deliver what the speaker understands about her emotions and what she does not.
  6. Do not use dialogue solely to impart information.
  7. Questions do not always need to be answered. What isn’t said is often more interesting than what is.
  8. When in doubt, use said. Better yet, write voices so distinctly they don’t need attribution.
  9. Use exclamation points reluctantly!!!!!! 😉
  10. Read your work aloud. Good dialog is rhythmic and easy to read.

Some Terrific Writers on the Subject:

Eudora Welty: Dialogue has to show not only something about the speaker that is its own revelation, but also maybe something about the speaker that he doesn’t know but the other character does know.

Edith Wharton: Dialogue in fiction should be reserved for the culminating moments and regarded as the spray into which the great wave of narrative breaks in curving toward the watcher on the shore.

Elmore Leonard: Never use an adverb to modify the verb “said”… he admonished gravely.

Mark Twain (from his wonderful “Rules for Literary Fiction”): That the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the corpses from the others.

If you find this helpful, please consider sharing it with friends. And best of luck with your writing!
Meg

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Filed Under: Top Writing Tips, Writing Quotes and Other Literary Fun, Writing Tips

Meg Waite Clayton


Meg Waite Clayton is the New York Times and internationally bestselling author of eight novels, including the Good Morning America Buzz pick and New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice THE POSTMISTRESS OF PARIS, the National Jewish Book Award finalist THE LAST TRAIN TO LONDON, the Langum-Prize honored THE RACE FOR PARIS, and THE WEDNESDAY SISTERS, one of Entertainment Weekly’s 25 Essential Best Friend Novels of all time. Her novels have been published in 23 languages. She has also written more than 100 pieces for major newspapers, magazines, and public radio, mentors in the OpEd Project, and is a member of the National Book Critics Circle and the California bar. megwaiteclayton.com

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