Explainations.

ZannaPerry · Oct 8, 2007

When writing in your character's POV and they are either alone or with someone else, but it's quiet...no real action going on...and your current POV is thinking about everything going on with him/her in the story-- the event/murder/threat/etc...

I find explaining where there's no dialogue being a challenge.

Any advice?

CaroGirl · Oct 8, 2007

I think you might be talking about stream of consciousness. If your story requires some internal reflection and random thought, try taking a look at how the masters do it. Virginia Woolf and Margaret Atwood write with a stream-of-consciousness style in their novels.

The trick to making it work, I think, is to put yourself solidly in your pov character's head; experience what she's experiencing. How would you feel? What would you be thinking about?

Libbie · Oct 8, 2007

SuzyB said:
When writing in your character's POV and they are either alone or with someone else, but it's quiet...no real action going on...and your current POV is thinking about everything going on with him/her in the story-- the event/murder/threat/etc...

I find explaining where there's no dialogue being a challenge.

Any advice?

If there's no action and no dialogue, you probably need to cut the scene out.

If you just mean that the action is relatively un-thrilling, but it is significant to the plot then maybe an "internal dialogue" thing would be appropriate. The character reflecting on something relevant to the plot while performing otherwise mundane-seeming actions. But the actions shouldn't be completely mundane - they should have SOME bearing on the story.

melaniehoo · Oct 8, 2007

I agree with CaroGirl. Stream of consciousness, when done well, can move a story along.

Devil Ledbetter · Oct 8, 2007

Libbie said:
If there's no action and no dialogue, you probably need to cut the scene out.

Are you kidding? Sometimes the most powerful scenes consist of a character internally agonizing over a situation. Often, a quiet and more thoughtful scene is precisely what's needed after high drama or intense action. Through a stream of consciousness scene, we can learn a great deal about a character.

blacbird · Oct 8, 2007

Devil Ledbetter said:
Through a stream of consciousness scene, we can learn a great deal about a character.

And often, if it isn't done really well, we can learn through a stream of consciousness scene (or a succession of such) that it's time to start reading another novel.

caw

Devil Ledbetter · Oct 8, 2007

blacbird said:
And often, if it isn't done really well, we can learn through a stream of consciousness scene (or a succession of such) that it's time to start reading another novel.

caw

Is there ANYTHING that shouldn't be done well? Other than steak?

blacbird · Oct 8, 2007

Devil Ledbetter said:
Is there ANYTHING that shouldn't be done well? Other than steak?

"Should be" isn't synonymous with "is".

caw

Garpy · Oct 8, 2007

Nice bit of jousting there guys.

Devil Ledbetter · Oct 8, 2007

blacbird said:
"Should be" isn't synonymous with "is".

caw

I didn't say it was. Is there something about my posts that compels you to reply with snarky, obvious comments? Because it's starting to bore me.

blacbird · Oct 8, 2007

Devil Ledbetter said:
I didn't say it was. Is there something about my posts that compels you to reply with snarky, obvious comments? Because it's starting to bore me.

Sorry you took it that way, or that it came across that way. That wasn't my intention, at all. Just trying to make the point that some of the very worst, unreadable writing I've ever seen in manuscripts is alleged "stream-of-consciousness" writing. All too often it's a masquerade for undisciplined blather in the absence of any real story to be told.

caw

Bufty · Oct 8, 2007

When a scene is over, try having your character react to what happened in that scene, by having a 'sequel' - in other words he'll think about the events or conclusion of the scene that just happened. The same way you would in any similar situation.

Have the character react with some sort of emotion, review briefly what happened, weigh up the pros and cons of what to do next, and then decide on his next step or goal.

That's four distinct steps - cover each one.

He may do this 'thinking' on his own - he may have someone to share it with - makes no difference. His 'decision' on what to do next will lead you on to the next scene. Then another sequel -it can be a very brief sequel of perhaps only a line or two, but a sequel nevertheless - and then another scene, however short or long that may be, and so on.

Good luck, Suzy. Hope that helps, but whatever you do, don't pad simply to fill up space.

I always understood 'stream of consciousness' writing to be something totally uncontrolled - letting the mind wander freely. That's not what you want here in my humble opinion. You want to know exactly what you are doing.

David I · Oct 8, 2007

Libbie said:
If there's no action and no dialogue, you probably need to cut the scene out.

I'm not quite sure what everyone is concluding this is a "scene". Nor am I sure why the initial poster thinks it needs to be told from deep in the POV of a character. Psychic distance can be adjusted as needed, and short passages of narrative summary can be marvelous. But they certainly aren't "scenes." Just to make up an example (and not claiming this is gripping writing or great prose):

Downtown Hildenberg had made an effort to remake itself into a tourist center in the 1980s, but with the nearest freeway offramp ten miles distant the expected river of cash had bypassed the town and flowed downstream to Fielding instead. What Hildenburg had to show for its makeover was a Tourist Information kiosk in the town square, three failed restaurants, and a coffee bar which had posted handpainted signs between its tattered curtains announcing that it also sold Lotto tickets and live bait.

Bob squinted at the coffee bar as he cruised by, and realized it occupied the storefront that once belonged to Kerry's Books. He wondered if any of the Kerry kids were still around.

Fat chance. Anybody who could get out of this hole was long gone.

My only point here is that Paragraph 1 is in narrative summary and from a long psychic distance--one which is influenced by Bob's POV, but is really in the narrative voice of the book.

Paragraph 2 is in Bob's POV, and we are narrowing the psychic distance.

Paragraph 3 is in Bob's POV, and dialed in to a very narrow psychic distance, where we get his thoughts as part of the narrative flow.

All of these are okay, as long as you change the psychic distance gracefully. And sometimes the best and most economical way to lay down some facts and generalizations is in short narrative summary. It's legal. Really. Great writers do it all the time.

I think the need for everything to be dramatized is greatly overemphasized, and leads to much bad dialogue (and equally bad internal monologue). I know this is because so many beginners err on the side of telling rather than showing, but there is such a things as too much showing, and not everything that happens and moves the sotry along needs to be dramatized.

J. R. Tomlin · Oct 8, 2007

Bufty said:
I always understood 'stream of consciousness' writing to be something totally uncontrolled - letting the mind wander freely. That's not what you want here in my humble opinion. You want to know exactly what you are doing.

Stream of counsciousness is NOT totally uncontrolled. Anything less "uncontrolled" than one of the masters of the style, I honestly can't imagine.

Good lord, I'm just speechless at that description.

You are quite welcome to hate James Joyce's writing, but anyone who says it is uncontrolled just hasn't a clue. Honestly. More readable, but also frequently using stream of consciousness as mentioned is Atwood. She, as with others who are masters of the style, controls every word. Sorry. I'm trying to control the rant.

Edit: By the way, David I, Paragraph 1 of your example looks to me like a classic info-dump, nothing more. What most info-dumps need is to be cut.

joetrain · Oct 8, 2007

if the internal s* starts dragging, cut it up into pieces and put it amongst action. if the mc thinking about things is effecting the story, you can put those thoughts, sometimes reduced to their conclusions for efficiency, before, inside of or after the action they're effecting. just one strategy.

good s-of-c is, well, good, but without background music it can be boring to watch someone sit in a room and think.

sneakers145 · Oct 8, 2007

And also a lot of suspense and thrillers periodically have a character alone with their thoughts that are somewhat summarizing to that point (seems to happen several times in the book, maybe a device to make sure your reader is paying attention??)

And I agree with David. Little blurbs like he wrote go a long way in scene setting. It's part of a scene, as Bob is en route somewhere, for a reason (plot advancing), and it gives us a bit of insight into Bob's character.

aadams73 · Oct 8, 2007

Bufty said:
When a scene is over, try having your character react to what happened in that scene, by having a 'sequel' - in other words he'll think about the events or conclusion of the scene that just happened. The same way you would in any similar situation.

Absolutely. Jim Butcher has a really neat blog post detailing how to go about this right here.

Libbie · Oct 8, 2007

Devil Ledbetter said:
Are you kidding? Sometimes the most powerful scenes consist of a character internally agonizing over a situation. Often, a quiet and more thoughtful scene is precisely what's needed after high drama or intense action. Through a stream of consciousness scene, we can learn a great deal about a character.

Right, but I guess I've always considered the "inner dialogue" or stream of consciousness thing to be action or dialogue. I thought the OP was asking how to fill blank space where literally nothing is happening that moves the plot or reveals a character..

Libbie · Oct 8, 2007

blacbird said:
Sorry you took it that way, or that it came across that way. That wasn't my intention, at all. Just trying to make the point that some of the very worst, unreadable writing I've ever seen in manuscripts is alleged "stream-of-consciousness" writing. All too often it's a masquerade for undisciplined blather in the absence of any real story to be told.

caw

I agree with blacbird here. The only, only, only writer I've ever read who can pull off stream of consciousness for long stretches without making me want to throw the book hard against the wall is Douglas Coupland. And he doesn't always make it work out well, either.

Libbie · Oct 8, 2007

David I said:
I'm not quite sure what everyone is concluding this is a "scene".

...because most novels and stories are made up of a series of scenes that all relate to one another? It's a pretty logical assumption to make, given that we're talking about writing a novel here.

IMO what you posted as an example IS a scene - or at least part of a scene. Scenes can have narrative stretches. They're not solely action and/or dialogue. They are coherent "chunks" of story that serve to move the plot forward. In your case, Bob reflecting on the town and the Kerry kids will doubtless lead to some kind of action having to do with either the town or the Kerry kids. It's not just random filler to up the word count.

Elodie-Caroline · Oct 8, 2007

I quite agree with you. Sometimes people think differently to how they vocalise something, they say one thing and mean another. If we didn't go inside of our characters heads, then they would only be one dimensional people and our readers wouldn't understand them at all.

All of my beta-readers, for the novel I'm shipping around at the moment, told me how they thought that the internal conflicts of my characters were some the best parts of my writing.

Elodie

Devil Ledbetter said:
Are you kidding? Sometimes the most powerful scenes consist of a character internally agonizing over a situation. Often, a quiet and more thoughtful scene is precisely what's needed after high drama or intense action. Through a stream of consciousness scene, we can learn a great deal about a character.

ZannaPerry · Oct 8, 2007

Just the constant stream of conscious thinking is really all I'm asking. How can it be done, how can you not confuse yourself or the readers, etc. . .that was the question.

SpookyWriter · Oct 8, 2007

Explainations is misspelled.

ZannaPerry · Oct 8, 2007

explanations...oh, blah!

CaroGirl · Oct 8, 2007

SuzyB said:
Just the constant stream of conscious thinking is really all I'm asking. How can it be done, how can you not confuse yourself or the readers, etc. . .that was the question.

My answer was to read books that do it well. It's not uncontrolled or random, although it might occasionally seem so. As the writer, you know what you want convey through your character's thoughts. Keep that in mind while you write. Distill it to the moment of feeling. Be your character in that instant.

That continues to be my advice to you.

Explainations.

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