Comments on: MRUs Lesson 2

By: Judith

Judith — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 04:57:23 +0000

Randy,

Loved the poetic illustrations from yesterday. Haiku is one of my favorite forms — probably because of my short attention span. Never mastered the limerick — too humorless, I guess.

I’m looking forward to reviewing TPMRUs — haven’t mastered them yet. But you give me hope.

By: Ann Isik

Ann Isik — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 10:41:57 +0000

This MRU course has turned up at exactly the right time for me!

I’m ‘Snowflaking’ and about to get back to the actual writing (my planning is driving my characters nuts with impatience). It’s turning out that I’m half SOTP and half plotter as a writer.

I’m at the stage where I’m doing the Excel document of the list of scenes. What a revelation! I find I’ve already written first drafts of 7 chapters and there are a further 6 at least, to come!

What sort of a mess was I in to have written this much without even knowing it?

So far, using Snowflake, I’ve seen how I have had to change my novel series’ name and also the title of my wip - book one of the series. The theme has changed. This Excel layout is ‘excellent’ (sorry for the pun) and I’ve not used Excel before - it sounded suspiciously like I’d have to do something mathematical, which terrifies me, but it isn’t and it’s easy to master.

I’d never finish this novel without Snowflake. Never My brain’s too all-over-the-place. And it’s really fun!

What can I say but, once again,’thanks’ for Snowflake and right this moment, for MRUs.

Ann

By: Amy VR

Amy VR — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 11:27:37 +0000

So far so good… you haven’t lost me yet!

By: Mark Goodyear

Mark Goodyear — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 13:01:28 +0000

Another thing I’ve found about good dialog is that it quickens the pace of a scene.

Dickens’ thick paragraph of dialog reads slow because the text is all on top of itself. The divided paragraphs read much more quickly and easily.

A few months ago, I went on a Cormac McCarthy binge and wondered why he formats his dialog differently. It certainly serves to create distance between the reader and the characters–but why would an author want to do that?

By: Camille

Camille — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 16:44:22 +0000

I’ve read some contemporary Brit and Scot authors lately and notice many don’t use quotation marks, which took a little getting used to at first for this yank. But when it’s sharp, it isn’t hard to follow. With this kind of formatting, I think that if the dialogue isn’t sharp, it would get lost in the text. Makes me wonder how much sharper I would have to make my dialogue if I didn’t have the punctuation to help make it stand out.

By: Daniel Smith

Daniel Smith — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 19:08:19 +0000

I was wondering what the structure rules are for mixing character thoughts in with dialogue. In writing a case study this summer I used the standard structure for dialogue and mixed in character thoughts as italicized text. I think I’ve seen some Agatha Christie novels with this.

Is that even a good practice? It seems to me it almost violates the “show don’t tell” rule, but it certainly worked for my situation.

By: Davalynn

Davalynn — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 16:12:34 +0000

When I read the Dickens graph, it didn’t strike me as dialogue. It was more of a telling graph, like the examiner was telling us what the witness said, without using, “he said.” In some comments attributed to the witness, “he” is used, and you wouldn’t say that about yourself when speaking, unless you were Donald Trump. But the point is, when I read it, it worked for me. I think Dickens is trying to encapsulate the whole cross-examination, the quickfire back-and-forth, unbelievable excuses, the rallying.

I know we can’t write like that today and expect to keep a reader, even though Cormac McCarthy does. He kept me as a reader because the books were required for a class. I began “The Road” (ugh) with my teacher-pen, editing as I read. No quotes, no apostrophes for don’t and a few other contrations. Same thing with “All the Pretty Horses.” However, after awhile, the rhythm of his writing carried me along, I put my pen down, and I knew where I was going.

Won’t try that technique myself, though.

I’m looking forward to the MRUs. I always learn something.

Davalynn

By: PatriciaW

PatriciaW — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 18:47:10 +0000

I agree with Mark, that dialogue quickens pacing. However, I actually thought the single paragraph read faster. It became very clear that this was rapid fire, back and forth interrogation.

Had Dickens misfired by having one or both of the participants speak twice in a row, thereby throwing off the pattern and rhythm, it would have been very difficult to read and follow.

I wonder why he used both structures. Perhaps Davalynn is on to something, that this was really intended not as dialogue but as a narrative recounting of a dialogue.