{"id":11675,"date":"2025-10-29T06:58:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-29T10:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=11675"},"modified":"2025-10-28T19:17:39","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T23:17:39","slug":"every-words-a-choice-part-10-dialog-go-for-it-and-character-names","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=11675","title":{"rendered":"Every Word\u2019s a Choice \u2013 Part 10 \u2013 Dialog, Go for it!, and Character Names"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In the last of these brief essays on how to choose the most effective words for your writing, we turn to dialog. We hear people talking all the time. Dialog should be easy to write, right? Then why is it so often tedious to read? Anthony Lane called his recent essay<\/a> on the writing of Elmore Leonard \u201cEasy Music\u201d (The New Yorker<\/em>, July 7 and 14), and that\u2019s a perfect title. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lane\u2019s essay was prompted by C.M. Kushins\u2019 new book Cooler than Cool: The Life and Work of Elmore Leonard<\/a>. <\/em>Reading Leonard, I learned a lot about writing dialog, mainly, don\u2019t write too much. Most conversations are surprisingly truncated. Reading dialog in which a characters spell out their full thoughts are boring, but it takes a deft hand to make sure the meaning is encapsulated in as few words as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lane (no word-choice slouch himself) marvels at Leonard\u2019s skill, given what he calls the infinite bandwidths of spoken English. \u201cSo sharp are his ears, when pricked up, that somebody, way back in the Leonard genealogy, must have made out with a lynx.\u201d As Leonard himself has said, and this applies well to dialog, \u201cIt doesn\u2019t have to make sense, it just has to sound like it does.\u201d Strictly grammatical? Less important than impactful and believable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In general, dialog offers great opportunities to express your own and your characters\u2019 style In fact, you want<\/strong> characters to have quirks in their speech; they help readers distinguish one character and one point of view from another. Yes, your characters can use slang, foreign words\u2014big words too\u2014if they are appropriate to them. It\u2019s how you handle them that matters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Foreign speech and dialect<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cormac McCarthy\u2019s book, The Crossing<\/em>, takes place mostly in Mexico. His text is like a course in how to handle foreign words\u2014in this case, Spanish. He doesn\u2019t do ham-handed things like include the translation in parentheses. Or repeat a Spanish phrase verbatim in English. He lets the reader figure it out, but he<\/em> keeps it simple<\/em>. Also, he picks words close to their English counterparts, with only a few that may be hard-to-guess. Most readers can carry on without interruption. They get the drift.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another example from a recent best-seller: An Englishwoman is trying to get information out of a bathroom attendant in Brittany.
She asks, \u201cAvez-vous travaill\u00e9 longtemps \u00e0 la gare<\/em>?\u201d
The answer: \u201c\u2018Non, Madame, j\u2019ai commenc\u00e9 ce poste le mois dernier seulement<\/em>.\u02bc She explains that she only took the job last month.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It seems to me much more artful ways could have conveyed what was a fairly obvious answer to what was a fairly obvious question than providing the response verbatim. In fact, after \u201cNon, Madame<\/em>,\u201d the particulars aren\u2019t that important. That was the answer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When you want to create characters who grew up in a particular country or US region, you may want their speech to retain some of that local flavor. Likewise the slang or speech patterns of teenagers or members of a particular ethnic group help establish their age or indicate their origins. The thing to remember about representing these speech patterns is: a little goes a long way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s dialog I wrote for a story set in New Orleans amongst the fictional Perdido biker gang; yes, it\u2019s quite different from what would be spoken in a Tulane English class:
\u201cDidja heah bout the fie-yuh?\u201d a man shouted, bursting through the door. At their blank looks, he said, \u201cOut at Aucoin\u2019s old fahm down near Delacroix.\u201d He said DEL-uh-cwa.
\u201cThat\u2019s all unduh watuh out theh, ain\u2019t it?\u201d a Perdido asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once I established this thick Louisiana accent for the Perdidos, I mostly left it behind, with just occasional reminders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It used to be the case that mis-spellings were used to show a character\u2019s speech was nonstandard or uneducated. That was called \u201ceye-dialect,\u201d and it\u2019s almost always pejorative. (Examples are \u201cwimmin\u201d for \u201cwomen,\u201d \u201clissen\u201d for listen; \u201cenuff\u201d for \u201cenough\u201d; the pronunciation is standard, the spelling is not.) Readers used to find eye-dialect humorous, but it went out of fashion decades ago. Even creative spelling meant to reflect the actual pronunciation, should be used sparingly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, try to achieve the impression of your characters\u2019 speech by the vocabulary, idioms, and word order they use and the rhythm of their speech. Remember the book Angela\u2019s Ashes? It well conveyed how poor Irish in the countryside spoke almost through rhythm and word choice alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get Creative!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

English is a living language. It evolves as needs and habits change. Andwith the creativity of its users. That is, you! We\u2019ve added to it, for a time at least, with widely understood abbreviations like IMHO, ROFL, and BOGO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s another type of example from a book I read recently: Joe \u201cgently made his way across the lobby.\u201d Hmmmm. \u201cGingerly\u201d would be more idiomatic, but \u201cgently\u201d expresses the thought quite well. Readers know Joe is impaired by a vicious hangover, and likely can visualize him moving tentatively, \u201cgently.\u201d Sometimes a word, deployed in an unusual way, can really work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s another one: \u201cThe argument sprayed out.\u201d Works, yes? No? If you\u2019ve created a new word or a new use of an existing word and you think it really works, stick to your guns! Use it!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Character Names<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

How do you pick the names for your characters? Nick and Jack are great names\u2014short, \u201cmanly.\u201d And sadly overused. Jason appears so often in thrillers, you can wonder which book you\u2019re reading. You may have to \u201clive with\u201d your character a while to find a name that truly fits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course your characters\u2019 names should be memorable and not too similar to each other. People may not read your book straight through. You have to help the skimmers, the sporadic readers. In one of her books, popular crime writer Patricia Cornwell named three characters Berger, Bonnell, and Benton. The book was nearly 500 pages long, and I never got them straight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A name can have intrinsic value. Some cultures believe a name can influence a person\u2019s destiny or character. In the 1800s, thousands of babies were named George Washington Whatever; one of them is my great-great-great grandfather, George Washington Wright. My great grandfather (other side) was Henry Clay Smith. Alas, a distant Tennessee cousin was Jefferson Davis Edwards. Do the names you give your characters influence their sense of themselves? Or what society expects of them? Are they influenced by stereotypes the name evokes? Psychologists believe this can be the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The name you pick can have some kind of explicit meaning: Rusty or Robin for a character with red hair is a straightforward example. Pope Leo XIV did not just pluck his papal name out of the air. He chose<\/em> it, he says, because he wants to evoke his predecessor, Pope Leo XIII, who espoused a doctrine of social justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When read a book in which a character has an unusual name, I consider why the author may have chosen it. David McCloskey\u2019s excellent spy thrillers feature a CIA operative who trains and oversees field agents. Her name is Artemis Aphrodite Procter. A name that calls attention to itself like that cannot have been an accident! It\u2019s actually brilliant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019ll recall that, in Greek mythology, Artemis is the huntress and Aphrodite the goddess of love. The name Procter is pronounced like the word for a person who oversees students, just as this character oversees new field agents, to whom she is fiercely loyal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How does the novel\u2019s character embody these elements? Quite literally. She has a row of nine stars tattooed between her shoulder blades. Each star represents one of her agents whose murder she has avenged. At the end of the most recent book, she\u2019s in a tattoo parlor, having a tenth star added to the array. Artemis Aphrodite Procter. Love and the hunt. Absolutely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I hope you\u2019ve enjoyed this ten-part series on the importance of choosing<\/em> the right words. You can find previous segments on my website, www.vweisfeld.com<\/a> under the Writers\u2019 First Draft tab. Go now, and create your magic!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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