Dialogue is ARTificial

Who the hell talks like that, anyway?!

There’s a common refrain among those criticizing a novel’s or film’s dialogue that “People don’t talk like that.” Therefore, because the way the dialogue is written does not correspond to how the reader imagines people talk, it is considered bad. But like anything in writing, the truth is a little more complicated.

Dialogue serves multiple purposes, one of which (maybe) is to mimic how real people talk. But that is just one of its purposes, and not a necessary one. What’s more important than mimicking real human speech is that it sounds credible to the reader in the world the book or film inhabits. However, credibility does not equal mimicry. In fact, oftentimes, great dialogue sounds nothing like real human speech. Rather, it provides the illusion of such, and it is a powerful illusion, but it is an illusion nonetheless. Writing good dialogue takes a lot of skill, and there are many different ways of writing it, but it’s purpose is not so much to sound like real people talking in everyday reality as to exude the appearance of how real people talk without the foibles inherent in real human speech

That is not to say dialogue never sounds like authentic human conversation. Sometimes it does. But dialogue that does this is usually not good dialogue, and can be boring to read. For day-to-day conversation is frequently banal. It is full of half-sentences, long pauses, non-sequiturs, sudden changes of topic and monosyllabic responses (like when you’re talking to your significant other and they aren’t paying attention to you. There are a lot of “yeahs,” “uh huhs,” “okays,” and “sures”).

Normally, in real conversation, people don’t talk in more than one to two sentences at a time before allowing the other person to speak. There is no floral or extravagant or poetic language (one wonders if Shakespeare’s or hell, even Homer’s contemporaries criticized their dialogue for not sounding like how real people talk.) Meaning that if you are writing a character’s dialogue and it goes longer than two or three sentences, you are already ratcheting up the artifice which, again, is what dialogue is.

Much of real life dialogue is composed of small talk, but small talk is the death knell of good dialogue. Yes there are, like everything, exceptions to this rule, or rather, one exception, which is that if you choose to use small talk, it must be brimming with subtext that is telling us something essential about the characters. It should not be small talk for small talk’s sake, or because you are trying to reflect real world conversation. That right there is the first indication that dialogue is artifice—because rarely in any well-written novel will you ever see small talk, except in the most exceptional instances, and can we really say a world without small talk reflects real life in any way?

None of which is to say that dialogue should never be criticized for failing to sound like authentic human speech, or like everyday conversation. It’s just that when this criticism manifests, it’s usually not really because it doesn’t sound like how people talk, but because there are other issues afoot.

So let’s dig deeper—

DIALOGUE AS ARTIFICE

The truth is that nobody talks like characters in books. Or at least they usually don’t. Even when they do. Dialogue is stylized for dramatic effect, to convey information, to create tone and to move the story forward. In day-to-day life there is usually not some overarching story we are trying to move forward, no intended climax our lives are heading for (except for death, which is a whole other conversation—most novels do not, in fact, climax at the deaths of their protagonists). If you look at a really good dialogue writer, and then imagine you and your friends talking like those characters, you’ll see how silly that notion actually sounds.

Take this passage of dialogue from Philip Roth’s THE HUMAN STAIN:

"We get a restraining order on Farley and your secret is all over your quiet little backwoods town. Soon it's all over this town, it's all over the college, and what you started out with is going to bear no resemblance to the malevolent puritanism with which you will be tarred and feathered. I remember the precision with which the local comic weekly failed to understand the ridiculous charge against you and the meaning of your resignation..."

It is unlikely even Philip Roth himself ever spoke like this in a conversation with another person. It is clearly dialogue meant to be either read or performed, rather than mimicking the speech of the kind of highly educated protagonists that Philip Roth provides us with.

There are probably three primary modes of writing dialogue, that match the three modes of writing prose: Minimalist, Maximist, and Naturalistic.

So I’ll talk about these individually, and share some examples.

MINIMALISM

Ernest Hemingway, HILLS LIKE WHITE ELEPHANTS

Hemingway is a good enough place to start. Here’s a passage from his short story HILLS LIKE WHITE ELEPHANTS:

“You’ve got to realize,” he said, “that I don’t want you to do it if you don’t want to. I’m perfectly willing to go through with it if it means anything to you.”

“Doesn’t it mean anything to you? We could get along.”

“Of course it does. But I don’t want anybody but you. I don’t want any one else. And I know it’s perfectly simple.”

“Yes, you know it’s perfectly simple.”

“It’s all right for you to say that, but I do know it.”

“Would you do something for me now?”

“I’d do anything for you.”

“Would you please please please please please please please stop talking?” He did not say anything but looked at the bags against the wall of the station. There were labels on them from all the hotels where they had spent nights. “But I don’t want you to,” he said, “I don’t care anything about it.”

“I’ll scream,” the girl said.

Hemingway popularized this style of storytelling, which he referred to as the Iceberg Theory. Otherwise known as a theory of omission, the iceberg theory strives to provide readers with only the tip of a story’s iceberg, so to speak, whereas the real story, which is the subtext of the story, and is much, much larger than the piece we see visible, floats beneath the surface. You know, like an iceberg.

What makes this a useful example is what the story is really about. Comprised almost entirely of dialogue, this is the story of a couple at a train station having a discussion on whether or not the woman would have an abortion. On the surface, reading the dialogue as it’s printed on the page, it can certainly read as authentic. It certainly doesn’t sound inauthentic. Until you consider the facts of omission. Here is a story about abortion that never uses the word abortion. Nor the word child. Or pregnancy. Everything we know is purposely stylized so that the reader must draw inferences from the provided clues. That’s what makes this a literary conversation, rather than a conversation that reflects how a real couple would have this same conversation in the real world. Do sometimes people have conversations like that, full of vague innuendos and insinuations? Perhaps. But I’d wager it isn’t common.

Cormac McCarthy, THE ROAD

McCarthy’s The Road passes through similar terrain (no pun intended). McCarthy is interesting because he tends to combine minimalism with maximalism, but even so, it is hard to imagine real people talking like this—

You just dont want to say in front of the boy.

You’re not a shill for a pack of roadagents?

I’m not anything.

I’ll leave if you want me to. I can find the road.

You dont have to leave. I’ve not seen a fire in a long time, that’s all. I live like an animal. You dont want to know the things I’ve eaten. When I saw that boy I thought that I had died.

You thought he was an angel?

I didnt know what he was. I never thought to see a child again. I didnt know that would happen.

What if I said that he’s a god?

The old man shook his head.

I’m past all that now. Have been for years. Where men cant live gods fare no better. You’ll see. It’s better to be alone. So I hope that’s not true what you said because to be on the road with the last god would be a terrible thing so I hope it’s not true. Things will be better when everybody’s gone.

They will?

Sure they will.

Better for who?

Everybody.

Everybody.

Sure. We’ll all be better off. We’ll all breathe easier.

That’s good to know.

Yes it is. When we’re all gone at last then there’ll be nobody here but death and his days will be numbered too. He’ll be out in the road there with nothing to do and nobody to do it to. He’ll say: Where did everybody go? And that’s how it will be. What’s wrong with that?

McCarthy’s dialogue is simple and minimalist, but also comes across as biblical. Another example of how literary dialogue stylizes speech rather than imitates it.

MAXIMALISM

Cormac McCarthy, BLOOD MERIDIAN

While we’re on the McCarthy train we might as well dip into BLOOD MERIDIAN.

Maximalism is the opposite of minimalist. It seeks abundance in its level of detail and vocabulary. It is all-encompassing. Its purpose is to make you feel tightly wrapped in the cocoon of the story. It leaves little to the imagination. It wants you to hear and smell and taste everything. And in dialogue, it takes us on a journey into the interior of its characters.

Check this one out. As alluded to earlier, McCarthy combines minimalism with maximalism but the important parts her are more maximalist than minimalist.

The good book does indeed count war an evil, said Irving. Yet there’s many a bloody tale of war inside it.

It makes no difference what men think of war, said the judge. War endures. As well ask men what they think of stone. War was always here. Before man was, war waited for him. The ultimate trade awaiting its ultimate practitioner. That is the way it was and will be. That way and not some other way.

He turned to Brown, from whom he’d heard some whispered slur or demurrer. Ah Davy, he said. It’s your own trade we honor here. Why not rather take a small bow. Let each acknowledge each.

My trade?

Certainly.

What is my trade?

War. War is your trade. Is it not?

And it aint yours?

Mine too. Very much so.

What about all them notebooks and bones and stuff?

All other trades are contained in that of war.

Is that why war endures?

No. It endures because young men love it and old men love it in them. Those that fought, those that did not.

That’s your notion.

The judge smiled. Men are born for games. Nothing else. Every child knows that play is nobler than work. He knows too that the worth or merit of a game is not inherent in the game itself but rather in the value of that which is put at hazard. Games of chance require a wager to have meaning at all. Games of sport involve the skill and strength of the opponents and the humiliation of defeat and the pride of victory are in themselves sufficient stake because they inhere in the worth of the principals and define them. But trial of chance or trial of worth all games aspire to the condition of war for here that which is wagered swallows up game, player, all.

Once again, even in the 1800s, nobody spoke like this!

Philip Roth, THE HUMAN STAIN

Returning to THE HUMAN STAIN, which I referenced above, this is the continuation from that first passage of dialogue—

“Sure I can get you a restraining order,” Primus told him. “But is that going to restrain him? A restraining order is going to inflame him. I got you a handwriting expert, I can get you your restraining order, I can get you a bulletproof vest. But what I can’t provide is what you’re never going to know as long as you’re involved with this woman: a scandal-free, censure-free, Farley-free life. The peace of mind that comes of not being stalked. Or caricatured. Or snubbed. Or misjudged. Is she HIV negative, by the way? Did you have her tested, Coleman? Do you use a condom, Coleman?”

“Coleman, if you don’t,” Primus was saying, “does she use something? And if she says she does, can you be sure it’s so? Even down-and-out cleaning women have been known to shade the truth from time to time, and sometimes even to seek remedy for all the shit they’ve taken. What happens when Faunia Farley gets pregnant? She may think the way a lot of women have been thinking ever since the act of begetting a bastard was destigmatized by Jim Morrison and The Doors. Faunia might very well want to go ahead and become the mother of a distinguished retired professor’s child despite all your patient reasoning to the contrary. Becoming the mother of a distinguished professor’s child might be an uplifting change after having been the mother of the children of a deranged total failure. And, once she’s pregnant, if she decides that she doesn’t want to be a menial anymore, that she wishes never again to work at anything, an enlightened court will not hesitate to direct you to support the child and the single mother. Now, I can represent you in the paternity suit, and if and when I have to, I will fight to keep your liability down to half your pension. I will do everything in my power to see that something is left in your bank account as you advance into your eighties. Coleman, listen to me: this is a bad deal. In every possible way, it is a bad deal. If you go to your hedonist counselor, he’s going to tell you something else, but I am your counselor at law, and I’m going to tell you that it’s a terrible deal. If I were you, I would not put myself in the path of Lester Farley’s wild grievance. If I were you, I would rip up the Faunia contract and get out.”

See what I’m getting at here?

NATURALISM

Naturalism is, I think, what most writers strive for when they are not trying to be fancy. You’ll usually find this kind of dialogue in more popular brands of literature such as Stephen King, Carolyn Hooven and Elmore Leonard.

I’m going to use examples by Gabriel Tallent and Charles Bukowski, just because I like them.

Gabriel Tallent, MY ABSOLUTE DARLING

Rilke says, “I really like your coat.”

Turtle looks away.

Rilke says quickly, “No, like—I really do. I have nothing like that, you know? Like—cool and old?”

“Thanks,” Turtle says, pulling the coat up around her shoulders, drawing her hands back into its sleeves.

“It’s this whole, like, army surplus, Kurt Cobain chic you have.”

Turtle says, “Thanks.”

Rilke says, “so, Anna is, like—killing you on those vocab tests.”

“Fucking Anna, fucking whore,” Turtle says.

“Oh my god,” Rilke says, “oh my god.”

Turtle watches her.

“Oh my god,” Rilke says again, leaning in conspiratorially. “Don’t say that!”

“Why?” Turtle says.

“Anna’s really very nice, you know,” Rilke says, still leaning in.

“She’s a cunt,” Turtle says.

Rilke says, “You want to hang out some time?”

No,” Turtle says.

“Well,” Rilke says, after a pause, “good talk,” and returns to her book.

This brings us back to my initial point way up at the top about subtext. If you read this small passage without having read the pages that came before, it likely sounds rather banal and boring to you. At least until Turtle pops out with her “She’s a cunt” remark. But actually what makes this passage work is precisely that—we know something about Turtle and the way she lives and how she is being raised by her father that causes this tiny passage to overflow with subtext. Is it how people really talk? Sure, much more so than the other passages, yet not entirely. Each line here serves a purpose. And that purpose is subtext. Whereas in real life the language may not have been so carefully chosen to reflect something about the lives of the people having the conversation. Of course, in reality, there is subtext in everything. But here, the subtext is the point, which is what separates it from everyday conversation.

Charles Bukowski, POST OFFICE

Ah, Bukowski. Isn’t he just the best—

“Hank, I can’t stand it!”

“You can’t stand what, baby?”

“The situation.”

“What situation, babe?”

“Me working and you laying around. All the neighbors think I am supporting you.”

“Hell, I worked and you laid around.”

“That’s different. You’re a man, I’m a woman.”

“Oh, I didn’t know that. I thought you bitches were always screaming for equal rights?”

“I know what’s going on with little butterball in back, walking around in front of you with her tits hanging out …”

“Her tits hanging out?”

“Yes, her TITS! Those big white cow-tits!”

“Hmmm … They are big at that.”

“There! You see!”

“Now what the hell?”

“I’ve got friends around here. They see what’s going on!”

“Those aren’t friends. Those are just mealy-mouthed gossips.”

“And that whore up front who poses as a dancer.”

“She’s a whore?”

“She’ll screw anything with a cock.”

“You’ve gone crazy.”

“I just don’t want all these people thinking I am supporting you. All the neighbors …”

“God damn the neighbors! What do we care what they think? We never did before. Besides, I’m paying the rent. I’m buying the food! I’m making it at the track. Your money is yours. You never had it so good.”

“No, Hank, it’s over. I can’t stand it!”

I got up and walked over to her. “Now, come on, baby, you’re just a little upset tonight.” I tried to grab her. She pushed me away. “All right, god damn it!” I said. I walked back to my chair, finished my drink, had another.

“It’s over,” she said, “I’m not sleeping with you another night.”

“All right. Keep your pussy. It’s not that great.”

“Do you want to keep the house or do you want to move out?” she asked.

“You keep the house.”

“How about the dog?”

“You keep the dog,” I said.

“He’s going to miss you.”

“I’m glad somebody is going to miss me.”

Here the purpose is to have a conversation that reflects the kind of conversation millions of blue collar couples the world over have probably had with their significant others. But now there is a wrinkle—We are getting a first person description of how this conversation took place, meaning that in all likelihood the real conversation didn’t sound like this at all. This is the narrator’s interpretation of the conversation, or the way that he remembers it. So as a storyteller, he is remembering it in a way that makes him come across as a little more of the hero, the real winner of the conversation, and at the same time he is trying to entertain us, his readers. So though it sounds more natural than the other examples, it is even still an exercise in how writers stylize dialogue to suit their purposes.

DON’T INFO DUMP (a word on exposition)

V.C. Andrews, THE FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC

Often, when people complain about a book’s dialogue with “people don’t talk like that,” what they are responding to is the author’s need to write long passages of exposition in the form of dialogue to clue the reader (and the characters) in to important information. This is called info dumping, and there probably is no one in the world who talks in expositional info dumps except lawyers, politicians, and the occasional gossip (and even the gossip will attempt to add some shrewd flare to their gossip that will tell you more about their character than the gossip itself).

Exposition is almost always bad, even outside of dialogue, when long descriptions of back story can be like wading through quicksand. All you want is to get out of it, escape to the next important moment of the story. Most of us, I think, when we encounter exposition like this, tend to skim.

One of the worst offenders of bad expositional dialogue is V.C. Andrews.

Take these passages from FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC—

“Mrs. Dollanganger,” he began in a flat voice that sent immediate panic into my heart, “we’re terribly sorry, but there’s been an accident on Greenfield Highway.”

“Oh . . .” breathed Momma, reaching to draw both Christopher and me against her sides. I could feel her quivering all over, just as I was. My eyes were magnetized by those brass buttons; I couldn’t see anything else.

“Your husband was involved, Mrs. Dollanganger.”

A long sigh escaped from Momma’s choked throat. She swayed and would have fallen if Chris and I hadn’t been there to support her.

“We’ve already questioned motorists who witnessed the accident, and it wasn’t your husband’s fault, Mrs. Dollanganger,” that voice continued on, without emotion. “According to the accounts, which we’ve recorded, there was a motorist driving a blue Ford weaving in and out of the lefthand lane, apparently drunk, and he crashed head-on into your husband’s car. But it seems your husband must have seen the accident coming, for he swerved to avoid a head-on collision, but a piece of machinery had fallen from another car, or truck, and this kept him from completing his correct defensive driving maneuver, which would have saved his life. But as it was, your husband’s much heavier car turned over several times, and still he might have survived, but an oncoming truck, unable to stop, crashed into his car, and again the Cadillac spun over . . . and then . . . it caught on fire.”

Never had a room full of people stilled so quickly. Even the young twins looked up from their innocent play, and stared at the two troopers.

“My husband?” whispered Momma, her voice so weak it was hardly audible. “He isn’t . . . he isn’t . . . dead . . . ?”

“Ma’am,” said the red-faced officer very solemnly, “it pains me dreadfully to bring you bad news on what seems a special occasion.” He faltered and glanced around with embarrassment. “I’m terribly sorry, ma’am—everybody did what they could to get him out . . . but, well ma’am . . . he was, well, killed instantly, from what the doc says.”

Someone sitting on the sofa screamed.

It should be fairly obvious what is wrong here. The police officer’s purpose is just to dump a ton of information on the reader and none of it comes across as artful or authentic.

A little later we get this gem—

“The odds are all against a baby,” he said fervently. “Just one time—there won’t be a conception. I swear there won’t be another time—no matter what! I’ll castrate myself before I’ll let it happen again!” Then he had pulled me tightly against him so I was crushed so hard it hurt my ribs. “Don’t hate me, Cathy, please don’t hate me. I didn’t mean to rape you, I swear to God. There’s been many a time when I’ve been tempted, and I was able to turn it off. I’d leave the room, go into the bathroom, or into the attic. I’d bury my nose in a book until I felt normal again.”

Tight as I could, I wrapped my arms around him. “I don’t hate you, Chris,” I whispered, pressing my head tightly against his chest. “You didn’t rape me. I could have stopped you if I’d really wanted to. All I had to do was bring my knee up hard, where you told me to. It was my fault, too.”

Whatever you do, don’t write like V.C. Andrews.

A Word on Period Novels

Period novels offer a particular challenge to contemporary writers, especially if the period they take place in is over 150 years or so, when there were no recording devices that could clue the writer into how people spoke in that time or place. But there are some workarounds, all of which, unfortunately, will put authenticity at risk. Though from my own point of view I don’t put a whole lot of stock into authenticity as it relates to fiction, anyway.

One thing you could do if you are writing a period novel is of course to read other period novels. The problem here is that, as I’ ve been talking about this whole time, dialogue is artificial and seldom reflects how real people talk. Therefore if you are basing your dialogue on other novels of the period, really all you’re doing is imitating that writer’s style rather than getting authentically closer dialogue.

Another option is to try to find transcripts of conversations people of the era had. A lot of times these might be political or legal transcripts, however, which won’t bode well if you’re trying to get as close as possible to the way people spoke. Not to mention, if you’ve ever read transcripts of a conversation, there are a lot of uhhs and umms and ellipses as people are putting their thoughts together. Again, this is something you won’t normally see in literary dialogue.

Probably the best thing to do, unless it is absolutely imperative that the style of dialogue accurately reflect a particular time and place, is to not think too much about it. As long as you are not utilizing modern slang and turns of phrases, using semi-contemporary dialogue is totally fine in a period piece (just ask Quentin Tarantino), and usually your readers will thank you for it. One thing you definitely don’t want is to get so in the weeds of your period dialogue that it comes across looking silly and goofy. If you insist on using authentic period dialogue, you better be damn good at it or else your audience is going to laugh at you. Much better to use natural modern dialogue than that.

A NOTE ON TARANTINO

Quentin Tarantino is often cited as an example of a great dialogue writer. And he really is. But I will once again wager that this is because of its stylized, artificial quality than because he is writing dialogue that reflects how people really speak.

Here are some examples—

Kill Bill

“Superman didn't become Superman. Superman was born Superman. When Superman wakes up in the morning, he's Superman. His alter ego is Clark Kent. His outfit with the big red "S", that's the blanket he was wrapped in as a baby when the Kents found him. Those are his clothes. What Kent wears - the glasses, the business suit - that's the costume. That's the costume Superman wears to blend in with us. Clark Kent is how Superman views us. And what are the characteristics of Clark Kent. He's weak... he's unsure of himself... he's a coward. Clark Kent is Superman's critique on the whole human race.”

Pulp Fiction:

“Don't you hate that? Uncomfortable silences. Why do we feel it's necessary to yak about bullshit in order to be comfortable? That's when you know you've found somebody special. When you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence.”

Django Unchained:

“Gentlemen you had my curiosity ... but now you have my attention.”

Reservoir Dogs:

“You guys like to tell jokes and giggle and kid around, huh? Giggling like a bunch of young broads in a school yard. Well, let me tell you a joke: Five guys sitting in a bull pen, San Quentin. Wondering how the fuck they got there. What'd we do wrong? What should we've done? What didn't we do? It's your fault, my fault, his fault. All that bullshit. Finally, someone comes up with the idea, wait a minute, while we were planning this caper, all we did was sit around and tell fucking jokes. Got the message?”

Hopefully I’ve given you something valuable to think about. Agree? Disagree? I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

---

Consider supporting my work by becoming a paid subscriber.

Yearly subscribers ($40/yr) and Premium Transgressors ($100/yr) can receive a signed copy of my novel HELP ME I AM IN HELL upon request.

Or just make a one time donation—this piece took a long time to write, if you enjoyed it, please pay me for it!

---

Thanks for reading. My debut novel HELP ME I AM IN HELL is out now.