1 The True Meaning of Show Don’t Tell; 2 Why Bother Showing at All? 3 6 Ways to Write Like a Movie Camera. 3.1 Letting Actions Speak for Themselves: 3.2 Avoiding Adverbs: 3.3 Using Dialog as If It Were Real: 3.4 Getting Creative with Details: 3.5 Personifying Emotions: 3.6 Relying on ALL Five Senses: 4 The Balancing Act of “Show, Don’t Tell”. Jun 19, 2012 You will never be told you’re cheesy if you describe a couch, but you might very well be told you’re cheesy if you try to describe loneliness. The phrase “Show, don’t tell,” then, provides cover for writers who don’t want to do what’s hardest (but most crucial) in fiction.
Show, don't tell is a technique used in various kinds of texts to allow the reader to experience the story through action, words, thoughts, senses, and feelings rather than through the author's exposition, summarization, and description. It avoids adjectives describing the author's analysis, but instead describes the scene in such a way that the reader can draw his or her own conclusions. The technique applies equally to nonfiction and all forms of fiction, literature including Haiku[1] and Imagism poetry in particular, speech, movie making, and playwriting.[2][3][4][5]
The concept is often attributed to Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, reputed to have said 'Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.' What Chekhov actually said, in a letter to his brother, was 'In descriptions of Nature one must seize on small details, grouping them so that when the reader closes his eyes he gets a picture. For instance, you’ll have a moonlit night if you write that on the mill dam a piece of glass from a broken bottle glittered like a bright little star, and that the black shadow of a dog or a wolf rolled past like a ball.' [6]
The distinction between telling and showing was popularized in Percy Lubbock's book The Craft of Fiction (1921), and has been an important element in Anglo-Saxon narratological theory ever since.
- 1Examples
Examples[edit]
Ernest Hemingway[edit]
Nobel Prize–winning novelist Ernest Hemingway was a notable proponent of the 'show, don't tell' style. His Iceberg Theory, also known as the 'theory of omission', developed from his background as a newspaper reporter. The term itself originates from his bullfighting treatise, Death in the Afternoon:[7]
If a writer of prose knows enough of what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows and the reader, if the writer is writing truly enough, will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water.
Creative literature (as opposed to technical writing or objective journalism) in general hinges on the artful use of a wide range of devices (such as inference, metaphor, understatement, the unreliable narrator, and ambiguity) that reward the careful reader's appreciation of subtext and extrapolation of what the author chooses to leave unsaid, untold, and/or unshown. This suggests a form of respect for the reader, who should be trusted to develop a feeling for the meaning behind the action, without having the point painfully laid out for them.[8]
Chuck Palahniuk[edit]
In a 2013 article, Chuck Palahniuk (author of the novel Fight Club) goes as far as recommending a ban of what he calls 'thought verbs' ('Thinks, Knows, Understands, Realizes, Believes, Wants, Remembers, Imagines, Desires […]') favoring instead the use of 'specific sensory detail: action, smell, taste, sound, and feeling.'[9]
James Scott Bell[edit]
'Show, don't tell' should not be applied to all incidents in a story. According to James Scott Bell, 'Sometimes a writer tells as a shortcut, to move quickly to the meaty part of the story or scene. Showing is essentially about making scenes vivid. If you try to do it constantly, the parts that are supposed to stand out won't, and your readers will get exhausted.'[10] Showing requires more words; telling may cover a greater span of time more concisely.[11] A novel that contains only showing would be incredibly long; therefore, a narrative can contain some legitimate telling.
Orson Scott Card[edit]
Scenes that are important to the story should be dramatized with showing, but sometimes what happens between scenes can be told so the story can make progress. According to Orson Scott Card and others, 'showing' is so terribly time consuming that it is to be used only for dramatic scenes.[12] The objective is to find the right balance of telling versus showing, summarization versus action. Factors like rhythm, pace, and tone come into play.[13][14]
Yves Lavandier[edit]
In his book Constructing a Story and his webseries Hats Off to the Screenwriters!, Yves Lavandier argues that one can show with dialogue. He takes the example of a scene from Prison Break in which pure dialogue between Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller) and Tweener (Lane Garrison) shows (and not tells) that Tweener is an expert pickpocket.[15]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^British Haiku Society- occasional paper 'English Haiku: a Composite View'2002
- ^Wells (1999). How To Write Non-Fiction Books. Writers' Bookshop. p. 65. ISBN1902713028.
- ^Warren (2011). Show Don't Tell: A Guide to Purpose Driven Speech. Jerianne Warren. ISBN0615498353.
- ^Mackendrick, Cronin, Scorsese (2005). On Film-making: An Introduction to the Craft of the Director. Faber & Faber. p. xxiii. ISBN0571211259.CS1 maint: Multiple names: authors list (link)
- ^Hatcher (2000). The Art and Craft of Playwriting. F+W Media. p. 43. ISBN1884910467.
- ^Yarmolinsky, Avrahm (1954). The Unknown Chekhov: Stories and Other Writings Hitherto Untranslated by Anton Chekhov. Noonday Press, New York. p. 14.
- ^Strychacz, Thomas F. (20 November 2017). 'Hemingway's Theaters of Masculinity'. LSU Press. Retrieved 20 November 2017 – via Google Books.
- ^Jones, Conrad (21 October 2013). 'How to Write a Novel in 90 Days'. Andrews UK Limited. Retrieved 20 November 2017 – via Google Books.
- ^Palahniuk, Chuck. 'Nuts and Bolts: 'Thought' Verbs'. LitReactor. Retrieved 9 December 2013.
- ^Bell, James Scott (2003). 'Exception to the Rule'. Writer's Yearbook 2003. F+W Publications: 20.
- ^Selgin, Peter (2007). By Cunning & Craft: Sound Advice and Practical Wisdom for Fiction Writers. Writer's Digest Books. p. 31. ISBN1-58297-491-8.
- ^Card, Orson Scott. Character and Viewpoint. Writer's Digest Books. pp. 140–42.
- ^Browne, Renne (2004). Self-Editing for Fiction Writers (2nd ed.). Harper Resource. pp. 12–14. ISBN0-06-054569-0.
- ^Kress, Nancy (March 2006). 'Better Left Unsaid'. Writer's Digest. p. 20.
- ^Episode 4 of Yves Lavandier's Hats Off to the Screenwriters!
External links[edit]
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Posted by2 years ago
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I hate it when movies have unnaturally sounding dialogue filled with exposition that is only there to inform the audience about something. To me that is lazy writing, lazy filmmaking and it just screams 'infodump for the dumb audience' in a way that takes me out of the movie completely. I understand that certain things simply need to be said and explained, but at the same time so many things can be shown instead of told. After all, movies are a visual medium.
Like the other day I was watching Frailty and at the very beginning there is a shot at a parking space reserved for Agent Doyle. A man parks there and gets out of the car and you immediately know he is an FBI agent, probably high ranking since he has his own parking space, and you know his name. It's a stupid, small thing, but it's so much better than this:
Person A: 'Hello, man who is going to introduce me to the audience.'
Person B: 'Oh, hi there. As you know, you are special agent Doyle with the fancy parking spot.'
So what are your favorite examples of 'show, don't tell'? It could be a little thing.
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