Large blocks of dialogue?

Techs Walker · Aug 12, 2017

Hey Beary,

BearyCuddly said:
Hello,
I apologize if this is in the wrong place, or if my post is objectionable in any way. Please let me know if this is so, as this is my first thread. If this question has been discussed already, I would appreciate a link to the thread. I did a search, and came up with nothing I found suitable for my situation.

Broadly, my question is:
How do you handle a large block of one-sided dialogue in a fantasy novel? I have already broken it up with some appropriate actions, and periodically pulled my character out of the conversation to give it some depth, but it still seems like a lot of one person talking.

More specifically (in case it helps):
A wizard has come to town, and is explaining to my character's parents (In broad terms, so that it can be explained better later, and to help minimize the amount of dialogue, but it still requires a lot of information to be conveyed to his parents;
-What the school is
-The head of the school telling people to go search for children with potential
-A crash-course in magical potential
-Why their child is suitable
-What being in the school means/will entail
-A rough, broad idea of what it will mean for him to become a wizard

Things like that. I'm not considering it an info-dump, because it is pertinent information to the story at this point. It's what sets up the kid to leave home in the first place, and the mother, especially considering her history with the matter, would want information, and lots of it. The problem is, it's a couple of pages of the wizard speaking. It's broken up into paragraphs, interspersed with appropriate action. I even have a section that includes some Q&A in the middle. Heck, the wizard even acknowledges
that she's been speaking for a long time!
I do have a potential out, if it's needed, but I really don't want to do it, because when it first occurred to me, it felt like a cop-out, and still does.

So, now that I've expanded greatly on the topic, how do you handle enormous blocks of dialogue, when they border on feeling like too much of one person talking?

Thank you, in advance, for your thoughts on the matter. I truly appreciate it.

I obviously haven't read your story, but I zeroed in on your mention of the mother's familiarity. Why don't you exploit that, so that much of the 'generic' information about wizard schools does not come out in this dialogue. Mom can tell husband: It's like that place where the Schwartzentruber girl went last year (or whatever). As other critters have pointed out, the contract scroll (which Mom snatches and proceeds to scrutinize) will cover some details that can also be postponed. For the reader, the postponed aspects can be brought out as the MC encounters them. OTOH, 'unique' information that both the parents and the reader would want to know now is why little Fortescue has been identified.

As well, in a later post, you mention that the child is the POV and is present at this point. So have him/her interact on any of the unique aspects that would be of interest, such as opportunities to pursue hobbies (ie papermaking), are the other kids all nerds, etc. You've already made a good move to have MC tune out at the 'boring bits', so squeeze every drop you can out of that one.

Good luck with it,

Techs

Laer Carroll · Aug 12, 2017

benbenberi said:
Dumps of new information presented up-front, no matter how engagingly, also suffer from the defect that they generally don't mean anything TO THE READER at the time they're presented.

Good point. As I've said, large blocks of dialogue CAN be engaging, but putting one at the very beginning almost certainly won't be for the reasons Ben mentioned. Only a truly amazing virtuoso writer could pull it off.

DancingMaenid · Aug 14, 2017

BearyCuddly said:
The problem is, in this section, I'm answering questions a family would ask before sending one of their children (whom they love) off to some unknown place, for unknown school. To use your analogy, it is, essentially, explaining to Muggles who love their child, about Hogwarts. How would you shorten that? There's a lot of questions, and the answers are not short, or easy. I tried to shorten and lessen the dialogue, but it's hard.

You probably don't need to show every moment of the exchange in order to get this across. You can infer or allude to some of it. For example:

"But what about academics?" Sarah's mom asked. "This magic stuff is all well and good, but will Sarah be able to go in to a regular university if she chooses?"

"[Reasonably short answer from the wizard.]"

Sarah's mom had a number of other questions about everything from extracurricular activities to whether or not the school had internet access. The wizard answered each question patiently and at length, and by the time her mother was satisfied, Sarah had had three cups of tea and four scones and was looking for an opportunity to take a trip to the bathroom.

This is just an example, but scenes like this can be a good time to gloss over the interaction or show just enough to get the idea across. The reader will usually get the idea.

Harlequin · Aug 14, 2017

I would shorten it down to questions the reader cares about, rather than what the parents care about.

indianroads · Aug 14, 2017

IMO - large blocks of texts are hard to read, and often get skipped through. I usually keep all my paragraphs short for readability, and long diatribes by a character in dialogue can come across as preaching. I say, break up the dialogue with questions and answers.

Al X. · Aug 14, 2017

indianroads said:
IMO - large blocks of texts are hard to read, and often get skipped through. I usually keep all my paragraphs short for readability, and long diatribes by a character in dialogue can come across as preaching. I say, break up the dialogue with questions and answers.

I could agree with those points, yes.

BearyCuddly · Aug 23, 2017

Hello again.
I wanted to thank all of you, again, for your thoughts here. There's a lot of good points, and I probably am going to edit even more out as soon as I can get back to it. You are all great, and I appreciate your thoughts!

Large blocks of dialogue?

Techs Walker

Laer Carroll

Aerospace engineer turned writer

DancingMaenid

New kid...seven years ago!

Harlequin

Eat books, not brains!

indianroads

Wherever I go, there I am.

Al X.

BearyCuddly