From Anne R. Allen’s Blog… with Ruth Harris:
It’s been said that if writing advice were classic rock, “Show Don’t Tell” would be “Stairway to Heaven. But is it always good advice?
Of course nobody wants to read a novel that tells a series of incidents. That can sound like a four-year-old recapping his day. “I had Froot Loops and then Dad took me to preschool and I played with blocks and ate a bologna sandwich and then I went to the bathroom and did number two…”
You want to show us the action in a series of scenes not tell us what happened. (Well, maybe we really don’t need the author to show the bathroom scene. )We know a “telling” sentence like “Veronica was beautiful,” is bland. It’s better to say something more like “Veronica’s flowing auburn hair and voluptuous figure had a powerful effect on Nigel and Clive.” That way we can show what she looks like and let the reader in on the emotional reactions of the other characters.
But a whole lot of writers, especially newbies (and the dreaded “writing rules police” ) take the “Show Don’t Tell” thing way too far and turn it into an unbreakable rule. That can make for some murky, slow, and downright boring fiction.
Here are some ways that following the Show Don’t Tell rule to the letter can interfere with good storytelling.
Too Much “Show Don’t Tell” Slows the Pace.
If you spend ten pages describing the shabby apartment of the murder witness, and we hear the screaming children and the blaring TV and smell the unemptied cat litter box and overflowing garbage can, you have a vivid description, but no story.
A writer should only dwell on the key scenes where important action is occurring. It’s perfectly okay to tell the reader your detective can see the witness is a harried single mom who is barely able to cope so her testimony may be useless. Then he can move on with the investigation and the story the reader cares about.
Some newbie writers confuse descriptions of violence with conflict. If you describe every blow and scream of pain in a fight scene, your story is not moving forward. The story stops until we know how the characters react to what’s going on and how the fight alters the trajectory of the plot. The carnage needs to do something to the characters and contribute to the plot, or it’s no more interesting than a description of the sofa cushions.
“Camera’s Eye” Showing Skimps on Information
When we write as if we’re a camera simply recording the physical events of the story, we are showing, but we’re also cheating the reader. This is when we simply say, ‘She winced’, ‘He smiled’, or ‘He took her hand,’ but we don’t say how the characters feel about this action.
When we fall into this pattern, we ignore the fact that the reader has no idea what the wincing, smiling, or handholding means. Writers who use this style may refuse to tell the reader what the actions mean, because they are convinced it will violate “Show Don’t Tell.”
This happens partly because most of us have been brought up on television. We have the conventions of the screenplay hardwired to our brains, because we saw TV shows before we could read. But what we see on the screen isn’t a screenplay. It’s the interpretation of the script by actors, directors, cinematographers, composers, and a whole host of other creative people.
When a screenwriter says a character clenches his fist, this clench will be interpreted by a director and actor to show a whole spectrum of emotion. Lighting and music and camera angle will enhance them.
But when a novelist tells us a character clenches his fist, he is not letting us in on much.
Is the character angry and about to punch somebody? Trying to keep from crying? Suffering from a painful intestinal ailment? We’ll never know if the author won’t tell us.
You’re not a camera. You’re a novelist. And it’s your job to give us as much information as possible to tell your story.
Link to the rest at Anne R. Allen’s Blog… with Ruth Harris
Like a lot of advice, or rules of writing, a simplistic interpretation of the idea can often be misconstrued; like show don’t tell, which is more like illustrate the feelings and show the problem rather than tell us what the character feels and what their problem is.
W. Somerset Maugham said, “There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.” I will reveal the secret three rules he professed not to know.
1. Do what works – corollary you have to learn what works.
2. Don’t do what doesn’t work – again one has to learn this.
3. To be a writer one needs to read and write – reading is learning, writing is practice.
The above is slightly tongue in cheek. Just saying.
My favorite show don’t tell book is by Janice Hardy.