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Return to your character descriptions
Did your protagonist go to Oxford? Or was he schooled by life? Is the heroine from Spain or New Zealand, and how does that cultural influence play out in their words? Did your antagonist grow up in a home full of screaming rage or a house with a snuggly grandma making tea? Whenever writing dialogue, I encourage you to return to the vision and background you have of your character and use dialogue to make that language come to life.
Did your protagonist go to Oxford? Or was he schooled by life? Is the heroine from Spain or New Zealand, and how does that cultural influence play out in their words? Did your antagonist grow up in a home full of screaming rage or a house with a snuggly grandma making tea? Whenever writing dialogue, I encourage you to return to the vision and background you have of your character and use dialogue to make that language come to life.
Read aloud
I know, I know. You’ve heard this before. But this piece of advice couldn’t be more important when it comes to dialogue. We often write what we think will be nice on the page, but read aloud, the tone can be all wrong, the writing can be too stuffy, or it just doesn’t sound right, plain and simple. Read dialogue aloud. Act it out. Get a feel for the way the words spill from your mouth.
I know, I know. You’ve heard this before. But this piece of advice couldn’t be more important when it comes to dialogue. We often write what we think will be nice on the page, but read aloud, the tone can be all wrong, the writing can be too stuffy, or it just doesn’t sound right, plain and simple. Read dialogue aloud. Act it out. Get a feel for the way the words spill from your mouth.
Listen in
This sounds like creepy advice, but it was given to me by a professor during my undergrad and it’s proven valuable since. Listen to conversations that happen around you. I’m not saying to spy or pry, but instead, to pay attention. Keep your ears peeled on the bus, in the coffee shop, in the waiting room at the doctor’s office. Writing can be such solitary work that we forget the necessity of being in the world, observing humanity as we try to recreate it. Listening to natural conversations will help you notice idiosyncrasies that sometimes go unnoticed.
This sounds like creepy advice, but it was given to me by a professor during my undergrad and it’s proven valuable since. Listen to conversations that happen around you. I’m not saying to spy or pry, but instead, to pay attention. Keep your ears peeled on the bus, in the coffee shop, in the waiting room at the doctor’s office. Writing can be such solitary work that we forget the necessity of being in the world, observing humanity as we try to recreate it. Listening to natural conversations will help you notice idiosyncrasies that sometimes go unnoticed.
Encourage others to read
Scary, I know. And I don’t give this suggestive nugget without a caveat that you should make sure you tell your reader what you expect from this exchange (advice? Rewriting help?), but it can be helpful to have someone else read your dialogue for a veritable sniff test in the real world.
Scary, I know. And I don’t give this suggestive nugget without a caveat that you should make sure you tell your reader what you expect from this exchange (advice? Rewriting help?), but it can be helpful to have someone else read your dialogue for a veritable sniff test in the real world.
Whatever you do, even if you’re writing about robots and aliens, remember that each character has their own voice—shouldn’t they be allowed to use it?
Kelly S. Thompson is a retired military officer who holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia and is a PhD candidate at the University of Gloucestershire. Kelly won the House of Anansi Press Golden Anniversary Award, the 2014 and 2017 Barbara Novak Award for Personal Essay, and was shortlisted for Room magazine's 2013 and 2014 creative nonfiction awards, placing 2nd in the 2019 competition. Her essays have appeared in several anthologies and in publications such as Chatelaine, Maclean’s, Maisonneuve, and more. Her memoir, Girls Need Not Apply, was an instant Globe and Mail bestseller and voted one of the top 100 books of the year.
