Dialogue
(My comments are in () below)
From the day we are born, dialogue is a part of our lives. As infants, we can't respond to our parents with words, so we express our feelings with tears or laughter. This exchange is our first experience of dialogue, (it's also part of a showing part of the story as much as it is the telling part of the story.) a phenomenon that will continue throughout our lives. It makes sense, then, that dialogue is an essential element of a story. It brings the characters to life while adding believability to the story. Let's take a look some of the important functions of dialogue.
First of all dialogue gives voice to your characters. This voice reflects personality, motivation and upbringing. In short, dialogue helps describe a character. Compare the following examples:
"Alas," said Mrs. Daly, "the rarefied air has weakened my spirits. I must return to the lowlands."
"Dang," said Joey, "it ain't no good up here in this air. I gotta get home."
It's very clearly told and shown that Mrs. Daly and Joey have two different backgrounds. Mrs. Daly uses elevated language while Joey relies on his hometown dialect. Take a moment to think about your own speaking voice. What does it reflect about own background and personality?
Lumna10-my own personal speaking voice stems off from the fact I want to speak truth because I have been in rooms with older people church people and non church people who were incredibly dishonest. I don't speak the truth just because I think I'm right I speak it because it's from experience of witnessing terrible dishonest people in my childhood. So when you hear me talk about truth like the way I complain about James Haynes and his disorganised lectures I'm just be truthful with you. I don't want to be right I just want people to have the truth there it's up to them how they use it not me. His writing lectures were over complicated and I have seen many people who are fictional pull off what he's talking about in far simpler ways like Patricia C. Kissack those Dear America Books are nearly as thick as my Book of Common Prayer yet the writing is simple and impressively impactful whereas when I read American books I always felt like parts of them were rushed because they ended too soon because chapters were not clear enough or just too short in general.. Both books have simple writing styles but the amounts of impact are wildly different between the two series of falsely categorized juvenile fiction. Yes, I said that. It's a stupid miscategorization of both types of books. I don't even consider Guardians of Ga'Howle Kathryn Lasky entire owl fantasy adventure series as juvenile fiction either there's huge adult themes in the books that kick off the start of the series and the ones that end it.
I'm not trying to be be right, and I will not convince you I'm I'm just putting the truth out there and maybe over a period of time when it's a month or year later you'll finally understand my point of view.
My worst teacher was a high school teacher from my Civics and Economics class there was a day when I supposed to have the time to go to the library to take my class test within a quieter place than within the classroom. i can't concentrate on important tests when my classmates were being too noisy. But when I got to the library and looked through my bag I discovered she never gave me the test at all I went back and asked her where it was she lied to me saying I must have lost it. I don't lose things that are that important. That issue was never resolved despite the fact that my Mom arranged a meeting between that teacher and my guidance and the teacher kept denying it. And in our days before final exams, she said to bring in our notebooks so she could burn them when I told my parents back at home my Mom was disgusted and said, "This is illegal." Thankfully it was a weekend so my Dad scanned everything I had and now I have a binder full of stuff that none of the other students about a U.S. A subject hardly taught in schools anymore. And what's more on parent teacher day she never showed up to meet with her students but when to her son's school parent teacher meetings instead, Skylights. I never wished her son harm I feel really bad for him. I never met him, but I do pity him because he was reared by an awful woman for a Mom even my Guidance counsellor didn't like and I never had a guidance counsellor of mine say anything like that about any of my previous regardless of whether it was in middle school or my two separate high-schools. You know a teacher's bad if a guidance counsellor doesn't like her at all. I never thought about getting back at her. My oldest sister did that to me and her other younger siblings by teasing us in the most creepiest of ways by using villain lines from fictional stories. I hated that made my skin crawl more than it should have. My oldest sister is meaner than I am and she can be excruciatingly judgmental and standoffish. I can forgive her for that standoffish behavior she has indeed traveled to London, England multiple times and so some of that comes from their influence as Gabriel mentions up above. Regardless, my Civics & Economics teacher's house years after I graduated from the largest high school here in North Carolina I heard her house suffered a fire. I wasn't mad or happy that it happened but felt like God gave me closure with the sudden house fire happening. I did pray for their safety for the sake of the woman's son she was raising. They were not killed so I do see the fire coming on her house as poetic justice for all the knowledge that she stripped from the students by burning their notebooks. All the students in those classes were people who had less than average high school learning skills and she damaged them and their lives more than she could damage me. I do books like this so that the less than average students and teachers and writers can get more validation than they are ever given credit for in their actual real life. So this is for you my unsung readers whoever you might be wherever you might be living. Know I do care. I want you to be as validated by me as my parents validated me alongside my guidance counsellor.
2nd point from Gabriel
This leads us to the next important point of dialogue—that it should reflect natural speech. Normally, people speak in short sentences, using contractions and familiar expressions. Your characters should do the same. However, don't over do it! Keep in mind that the dialogue has to be accessible and interesting. (James just why couldn't you just say that? It's beyond me honestly!)
3rd point
Dialogue also serves as a way to advance the plot of the story, offering a fresh alternative to narration. (James was constantly clumping dialogue in when describing narratives this man tells us that yes they are actually two separate forms of Narration a point of view both my Ohio English middle school teachers would agree with this definition compared to how James Hynes bothers to teach it.-Lumna10). For example, in mystery novels the plot unfolds through dialogue instead of action.
Note that in the example below—
"Where were you on the night of August 17th?" asked the detective.
"At the movies," answered Mr. Barlow. "What's it to you?"
"Some files were stolen from your office that night. Your partners have reason to believe it's you."
In the more than recent Bad Batch Star Wars Tv show there is a huge shift in the storytelling genre you have to take into account, Season 1 was your regular fictional telling of the events with some episodes relying more heavily on actions than dialogue of the group. The first half of Season 2 is solely adventure genre which involves loads of action being shown for the first eight episodes. In the second half of Season 2 more scenes are directed to dialogue than action and they stay that way far into the continuation of Season 3 which perfectly tells and provides with the fact that the ending season for the show is a mystery genre season. Yes, they totally pulled off execution of three genres of fictional stories very well in this show in just three seasons, Skylights."
James Hynes only ever brought up detective stories and crime stories and while a crime stories do include mysteries.
Your main characters of a mystery story won't always be of the detective sort and that is actually Bad Batch team is in Season 3 they are just soldiers doing a couple detectives' missions.
Echo and Rex are background detectives that come in clutch when they have to. But the story isn't told by them in Season 3 they're just a small part of it minor characters as of the whole story, Skylights. -Lumna10.
Of course, dialogue shows more than action. We can discover a character's feelings and motivations through conversation. Regardless of its purpose, always keep in mind that there should be a reason for the dialogue. A lingering or staggered or stagnant conversation will weaken a story.
Punctuation Dialogue
Here are four simple rules for punctuating dialogue.
1. Put dialogue within "" marks that means the words that are directly spoken.
2. Capitalize the first word of the direct quotation.
3. Commas and end marks go inside quotation marks.
4. When the speaker changes start a new paragraph. (Many authors I have read completely ignore this one, but it really shouldn't be so ignored.)
Now see how these rules apply to the dialogue below:
"Well, well, well," said Grandpa Marty, "it's good to see you again." (The first sentence isn't a complete sentence it's not even a clause or fragment of a sentence there's no subject and no active verb within the words— well, well, well" therefore the comma after the dialogue tag is accurate compared to James Hynes' rather selective point of view. And a short pause is more expected than the pause a period does when there are complete sentences divided by a dialogue tag that is also a complete sentence. -Lumna10.)
"How many years has it been?" asked Samantha.
"Too many!" answered Grandpa.
Samantha smiled and said, "We have the whole summer to get acquainted." The comma placement here is also appropriate too despite the dialogue having a capitalized first word that is because the writer recognizes speakers' body in real life their body is that body is involuntarily breathing for them during scenes of making public speeches and statements. The comma reminds us like real people fictional characters must be allowed all the breathing moments real people have accessible to themselves that is what makes dialogue look and sound natural especially if you read your written dialogue aloud to yourself. Have you done that can you feel the way and hear the way your characters' bodies are involuntarily breathing. Sighing is voluntary breathing but in my horseback riding lessons breathing is the last thing I do voluntarily. It comes involuntarily and very quietly so much so that my past riding instructor thought I was anxious when I wasn't at all. I'm a slow breather Just because my body looks tense also didn't mean I was anxious another thing she thought true that wasn't true about me.
I survived a horse's canter way before it was time for me to learn to canter at ten years old I was breathing back then but I couldn't even hear it that is how slow my lungs pump for me, guys. It was involuntary breathing during that experience. And if I can't hear my breathing involuntary then I agree with people who say that there is not evidence that Sky was past death in Season 2 when she healed him. And people who believe the other side are not considering realistic context clues. All scenes from fictional shows albeit a bit more surreal do reflect real events that do and can happen in the world over. -Lumna10.
Princess Bride shows the point with Wesley and in Once Upon A Time it's revealed that people can not always pick up on heartbeat and involuntary breathing by their naked ear. It's also revealed that even a machine can't always detect heartbeats or involuntary breathing with Henry at the end of Season 1's finale episodes.
1987 was the year the movie that the Princess Bride came out that makes Wesley's involuntary breathing during his death much older than the one in the Winx Club's Sky. Season 2 of Winx Club that came out in 2005 maybe the writers took inspiration from Wesley in the Princess Bride and weaved it into Prince Sky's character and in that case you have to consider the movie that brought them the inspiration and consider its own realistic context clues as well. Sky is actually quite similar to Wesley in a kinder and more forward and more understanding way the only thing that they just barely share is getting knocked out, but how they got knocked out occurs in two different ways, my friends.
The brain and heart aren't always the things that determine if anyone is clinically dead sometimes it involves your lungs too. We know Nabu could barely breathe in Season 4 he struggled to talk to Aisha he was stammering over his words and we know he was a heavy breather in that scene because you can hear it—his labored breathing is directly in the audio. (Labored breathing is a severe indicator that the body is in strong stress and pain. The least severe moment of labored breathing is going on a run in a park after you skip a year or two of running you will hear your labored breathing when you stop running to catch your breath and then most people say this, "Man, my breathing sounds like Darth Vader." I have had this moment myself but here's the funny thing Darth Vader's labored breathing hardly represents his body strength and the suffering it went through previously from in the original trilogy except for the small portion of his even heavier breathing in his struggle to throw the Emperor down a chute off the second death star. His labored breathing is really used only to announce hisself when we can't see where he is on screen like in that dark hallway corridor fight in where both Luke's and his outfits blend directly into the scenery during their duel on Cloud City in Empire Strikes Back's movie.
So those of you Winx Club fan who believe Sky actually died you're acting just like Scuttle who said Eric was dead too. -Lumna10
The only other time we know a character who has heavy breathing that can be heard by naked ear and is not labored breathing yet still involuntary breathing is before Prince Eric wakes up on the beach when Scuttle tries to tell us and get us to believe that the story might be ending sooner than we think by saying, "I can't feel a pulse," Princess Ariel is brilliantly wise enough to notice his breathing sounds. Normaniforever4 (Mentioned Ariel just for you, my friend.)
Extension
There are a variety of ways to present direct quotes in a sentence. Sometimes, for example a statement could be interrupted:
"Meet me early," said Joanne, "so that we can go surfing."
Use plenty of dialogue. Write a one-page episode. Choose from one of the situations below or make up your own.
A soldier calls home to his wife.
Three friends gossip about a new student.
An employee resigns from work, explaining the reasons to his or her boss.
There you are four new writing prompts for aspiring writers. Magic_Pyrix
RoyalBunny7