Dialogue is a challenging story element, but crucial to get right. I’ve read hundreds of articles and books about crafting dialogue for prose, film, and the theater and it remains a tough nut to crack.
Experts generally posit some form of this goal for dialogue: It should be interesting and natural-sounding, reflect the character’s voice, create conflict, and move the plot forward. But also be compact and choose every word purposefully.
Yeah, that’s easy.
What I’ve found in my reading is that it’s much easier to avoid bad dialogue than it is to write great. You can find a ton of advice on what not to do. Characters shouldn’t repeat each other’s names or start sentences with “As you know…” You should excise fluff and filler, such as characters introducing themselves or commenting on the weather, even if we do this in real life.
But specific how-to advice on writing memorable dialogue is sparse. Do you need help structuring your story? Follow the three-act structure or Save the Cat or the Hero’s Journey. Need advice on description? Less is more but be sure to pick specific concrete language and describe your world as your character would. There’s even practical advice on writing humor, which is entirely subjective. You still have to do the work on plot and description and everything else, but you can find methods that work until your skills evolve.
Unfortunately, there’s no similar game board for writing interesting dialogue (or I haven’t found it yet). No one can tell you how to start a sentence and where to drop in an expletive or metaphor. There’s no formula saying great dialogue consists of one long sentence, three short sentences, and a fragment. You can’t math your way to interesting conversations.
So, how do you get from:
“As you know, Bob, I’ve had a hard time since divorcing my wife, your sister Evelyn.”
To:
“They should have put you in a glass jar on a mantlepiece. Where were you when Paul was suckling at his mother’s teat? Where were you? Who was nursing you, poor Eli? One of Bandy’s sows? That land has been had. Nothing you can do about it. It’s gone. It’s had. You lose.
Drainage! Drainage, Eli, you boy. Drained dry. I’m so sorry. Here, if you have a milkshake, and I have a milkshake, and I have a straw. There it is, that’s a straw, you see? Watch it. Now, my straw reaches acroooooooss the room and starts to drink your milkshake. I… drink… your… milkshake! [sucking sound] I drink it up!”
- from There Will Be Blood by Paul Thomas Anderson
Shrug. Like Cher once said, if it came in a bottle, everyone would have a great body. We would all write like Quentin Tarantino or Paul Thomas Anderson or Wes Anderson or pick your favorite writer or filmmaker. It takes practice, both listening and writing.
Nonetheless, some insights can help us create natural-sounding dialogue, but for that we leave the world of writing advice and we examine human nature.
In A Year of Living Consciously, which I am using as a guide for my Year of Writing Consciously, Gay Hendricks points out that when we speak – even something innocuous – we have intention behind our words. When we listen, we also do so with intention: a preconceived notion, bias, or plan to respond.
In Hendricks’ example, the simple question “How are you?” means something different every time we say it. Consider what you mean when you say “How are you?” to someone you are meeting for the first time, to a friend you haven’t seen in a while, or to a close friend whom you know is going through a hard time. The same three words have a dramatically different intention depending on who you’re talking to.
To your struggling friend, you’re expressing concern and providing them the opportunity to talk about their problem. To a casual acquaintance, you’re inviting a quick catch-up on events that have occurred since you last spoke. To a stranger, you probably said “How are you?” by rote, intending merely to be polite. You aren’t really asking about their health or well-being, and it would be awkward if they gave you the details.
We also listen with different intentions. It’s a common challenge in relationships. Often, we don’t listen as much as we quietly (or not) wait our turn to speak. What the other person has actually said is almost irrelevant.
Consider this idea if you’re struggling with dialogue and conflict, as I do. My dialogue tends to be direct. I (probably) avoid the major pitfalls, but my characters almost always say what they think. They respond tit-for-tat to what other characters say. It’s not terrible, but it’s not particularly memorable. If my dialogue were a tennis match, it would be two reasonably good players batting a ball over the net back and forth. Great dialogue is akin to two competitors trying to score points. And naturally, one of those is more fun to watch.
Take a look at your dialogue and ask what your character is inviting when they speak. What is their intention? Do they want information? Does your character want to trick someone or start an argument? Do they start one conversation so they can eat up time and thereby avoid a different, more difficult, topic? Perhaps they’re disinterested and not seeking any response at all.
When your characters are listening, what is the intention? Is your protagonist listening for a lie? Is a character waiting to start an argument? Imagine having a conversation with a reliable co-worker and one you consider lazy. With the former, you might be listening for advice or a project update. With the latter, you might be listening for an excuse or a mistake.
When your character is listening to someone else speak, do they expect to agree or disagree with what that person says? Consider this statement: “This task isn’t worth doing.” Using the co-worker example, you might assume your trusted co-worker has a good reason for their comment, but you’ll assume the lazy person simply wants to get out of doing work.
Characters at cross purposes – with different intentions and desires – create conflict. Imagine saying “How are you?” to a stranger, who launches into a litany of their personal problems. You’d feel trapped. Conversely, how would you react if a good friend responded only vaguely to the same question? What if you knew that friend was ill but declined to discuss it with you or even pretended he wasn’t? You might feel rejected and wonder if your friendship had been damaged.
Conversation is more than what your characters are saying. Dialogue also contains their intentions. Listening is also part of dialogue. What a character is thinking or doing when not speaking influences what they’ll say next.
There’s no simple formula for writing great dialogue, but understanding human nature and thinking is one avenue to crafting more natural-sounding conversation. Go beyond the eavesdropping approach. That’s a great start, but examining the human desire and intention behind our words can help you develop character voice and conflict, and craft dialogue that’s more interesting than a verbal lobby.