Dialogue drives both narrative and character development. The key for creative writers is including just enough dialogue to meet those needs and no more. The last thing you want is to have your characters talking too much.
What do I mean by that? Well, my raw material included video of more than forty creatives–musicians, photographers, actors, and of course novelists–whom I had interviewed on a 2010 cross-country U.S. road trip. The memoir tells the story of how my encounters with these artists inspired me to return to an art-committed life, despite a family legacy of mental illness connected with creative pursuits. Each scene’s first draft began with a transcript of the conversation. I then started cutting and polishing, looking to convey just enough to advance the narrative lines of the story and the reader’s understanding of the narrator.
How to Judge the Worth of Your Dialogue on a Spectrum
How did I make those choices?
Let’s think of the use of dialogue in a story–fiction or creative nonfiction–as a spectrum:
The two ends of the spectrum are easy to address:
Cut the Scene Entirely
Does having characters engage in a particular conversation advance the story? If not, cut.
Include Every Line of Dialogue
A creative writer should never do this. Disagree? Record the next conversation at your dinner table and play it back while doing the dishes. You’ll be startled at how much extraneous material is found in even the most erudite conversation.
Every scene that made it into Committed operates in the middle of the spectrum, as follows:
Fully Realized Scene
Only about a half-dozen creatives in Committed advanced the narrative sufficiently to merit a fully robust scene. Where they appeared in the story factored into that decision, but sometimes I needed the reader to not just hear what these artists were saying but to get to know them; that required enough dialogue and action to more fully convey their true natures.
One occurs early on, when seasoned Vermont printmaker Sabra Field warns me that an art-committed life is not an easy one. Another occurs near the end of the book, when Idaho singer/songwriter Rochelle Smith sums up the lesson of many artists interviewed, namely that I need to “tell my story.”
Handful of Dialogue
Readers meet several of the artists in Committed in abbreviated scenes with a handful of quotes framed with summary dialogue. I found Birmingham, Alabama, photographer Marc Bondarenko fascinating, but only two parts of his interview advanced the narrative lines of the book, his love of motorcycles and his insight that spending time with another creative can spark a temporary connection. Much of Providence, Rhode Island, film director Eileen Boarman’s interview didn’t make it into the final book because the conversation occurs in a larger scene where the action taking place served the story better.
Present-Tense Summary
Committed is written in the present tense; the reader experiences the road trip in real time with the narrator. In some cases the reader “meets” an artist but never hears the artist speak. This happens because we are in the narrator’s head, and he tells us what he’s hearing, as well as the thoughts those words are triggering. I chose to use this technique with Portland, Maine, photographer Brian Fitzgerald for structural reasons. He appears in the third scene in Committed; the first two featured fairly robust scenes of dialogue. Feedback in an MFA workshop made me realize I couldn’t have each chapter follow a predictable pattern: arrive in town, conduct full-blown interview, leave.
Past-Tense Summary
How does past-tense summary work in a present-tense book? It has the narrator telling the reader, “So we’re here together on the road again. An hour ago I interviewed this artist, and here’s what you missed.” I was forced to take an interesting conversation with Salt Lake City, Utah, jazz singer and children’s book author Wendy Bradshaw and reduce it to a past-tense paragraph because she appears near the end of the book, and her insights, while welcome, had already been provided by other interview subjects.
You may have seen a 3D printer in action. If so, you know how long it can take to make layer after layer as it builds to a fully realized object. There are also many hours of inputting details into computer software before the manufacturing begins. I found it easier with Committed to go old-school and sculpt. Michelangelo claimed that when he sculpted he was liberating already existing art from within the stone. I took that approach in first writing a fully realized scene and then reducing it down to its core.
Tell me your opinion: What challenges do you face when writing dialogue and avoiding characters talking too much?
