Some time ago, I wrote a blog entry called "Three-Person Conversations." Now that I'm writing a book where my main character has three friends, and he's going to parties and public events a lot, I'm finding that I'm revisiting this context, and considering it in terms of multi-character scenes.
These scenes can be disorienting at times for a writer - and if the writer is feeling disoriented, imagine how the reader must feel! My main technique for avoiding confusion (all over my writing) is close point of view. The point of view allows me to provide a single person's understanding of the situation, and to control information by limiting it to that person's perceptions and judgments. Here are some more things to think about as you head into that crowded situation.
1. Consider the entry.
A. Is your character prepared for this situation? Does he/she expect it? What is his/her state of mind? What is his/her purpose in entering?
B. Is your character alone as he/she enters the situation, or does he/she have someone to bring him/her in who will give purpose and direction to their entry?
It's funny, but sometimes when I can't figure out how to get a character to walk into a room cold, I can help myself with the dynamics by giving him another person to walk in with.
2. Consider the character's general impression of the situation.
What does he/she notice first? A particular person, or group of people? An overall impression of chaos? Of bustling activity? Of subdued general chit-chat?
Establishing an initial overall impression of the scene will allow you to set up the general dynamic in the reader's mind; then you can focus on smaller interactions within it, and return to the general dynamic in transitions between those interactions.
3. Consider the drive of smaller interactions.
Is your character's goal the primary thing taking him/her from one interaction to another? Or is your character being buffeted by circumstance from one interaction to another, and trying to stay afloat?
Knowing whether your character or the situation is the primary driver will help you decide how to begin minor interactions and move between them.
4. Consider the dynamic of smaller interactions.
Is your character engaging in one-on-one interactions within the larger situation? What are the conditions under which more people would join each interaction? Interruption? Being brought in by one of the conversation participants? How does your point of view character react to this kind of complexity? Easily, or with some kind of emotional reaction? Are there any times when a single individual gets the attention of the entire group?
5. Within smaller interactions, make sure to consider each participant's motives, background and state of mind.
Even if you're not using other characters' points of view, keeping track of who is interacting and what they want will help you to differentiate between participants, which is especially important when many characters are present.
6. Consider how long each interaction should last.
Is there room within the larger situation for people to have long private conversations? Or does the larger dynamic keep smaller interactions relatively short?
7. Consider how to maintain the reader's awareness, both of the participants in smaller interactions, and of the larger situation.
Is your character aware of things going on outside the interaction in which he/she is engaged? How does that affect his/her engagement in the smaller interaction? Are there people present in the smaller interaction who don't say much but can be noticed in their body language so readers don't forget they are there?
I hope these thoughts give you some ways to analyze those party scenes, playground scenes, ballroom scenes, cocktail lounge scenes, and all the different kinds of multi-character scenes that may present themselves in your writing. I find that thinking these things through can help me improve a scene I've written on gut instinct, or head into a new scene that I'm having trouble starting.
So jump into the group dynamic and have some fun!
Showing posts with label three-person conversations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label three-person conversations. Show all posts
Monday, January 17, 2011
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Twists on conversational endings
Have you ever noticed the endings of conversations - particularly telephone conversations? Typically you get to the point where one person decides the conversation should come to an end, and so they say something to advertise that they're getting ready to go. It could be something like, "You know, I have to run," if the people know each other well. If they know each other less well it might be something like "I'm sure you're very busy and I shouldn't keep you." Or maybe one of the people talking will pick up on a piece of topic that the other person had mentioned about something happening in their future: "Well, have fun at the picnic!" or "Good luck with that project, then."
Step two in the process is that the other person has to reply with a piece of talk that will acknowledge that the conversation is about to end. "Oh, sorry, I'll let you go," would be one option. For specific future events the person could say, "Thanks, I think I will/I'll do my best/I'll see you soon/I'll talk to you soon." If this turn does not acknowledge the conversation-ending move, however, the person's attempt to close the conversation will fall flat. The person who has to leave may feel ignored and sucked into a conversation when they'd rather be somewhere else. The less direct the ending move (especially with language learners), however, the more likely the conversation partner won't notice it. By contrast, if at this point the conversation partner simply says "Okay, bye!" their farewell will come across as needlessly abrupt.
Typically after the ending move has been acknowledged, you will find another turn by the person who initiated the conversation-ending moves. This will be something like "Take care!" or "Yeah, see you!" This move is basically without content and serves only to confirm the fact that this person has no further topics to propose and the conversation can end safely. The other person then responds to this with "You too" or something similar, indicating that indeed, he/she has no further content to propose either. This is the spot where if someone has forgotten to say something, it may be introduced.
Following these moves (social/phatic moves) that are simply redundant indicators that it's okay to end the conversation, that's when we get the actual goodbyes. A goodbye is a speech act that functions to end the conversation. The moves of the last turn ("take care") can sometimes be interpreted or used as goodbyes, but for myself, I never quite feel like I've really put a button on the conversation without an official "bye!" This is another possible complication. Proposing a new topic at this point is a bit more unexpected and sometimes people will actually apologize for it (where they are less likely to earlier).
Those of you familiar with Instant Message conversations may notice that you often have to do this goodbye sequence twice. The delay in IM chats introduces the (relatively likely) possibility that you will initiate this sequence of ending turns while someone else is still typing topic related stuff. In this circumstance, you end up with a point of conversational ambiguity. The person trying to initiate an ending sequence has the option of responding directly to the ongoing topic and then adding on a re-initiation of the ending sequence. Another option is for him/her not to respond to the existing topic material at all (but this might be considered abrupt). Sometimes the person who was typing topic information will simply drop the topic and reply with an acknowledgment of the initiating turn. Sometimes another odd option occurs and you end up conducting two entirely separate ending turn sequences, one which follows on to the first initiation of the ending sequence, and another which follows onto the remaining topic material that the second person had been typing!
By this time, this has happened to me so much that I'm starting to think there must be some kind of a story here. Or maybe not a story core element, but something I could add onto another context. I wonder if one could write a story with a split ending and have it be plausible. Hmmm...
Another point where this might be relevant to dialogue is that phatic talk, the empty stuff with which we maintain social relationships, may or may not be important to your story. If the smoothness of the relationship between the two people speaking is less important than the information conveyed, leaving the last few turns of talk out of the dialogue is certainly fine. However, if the relationship is important and you're going to play with some of the twists mentioned above to create tension, it might be to your advantage to pursue the conversation all the way through to the end.
Just sharing my thoughts, as usual!
Step two in the process is that the other person has to reply with a piece of talk that will acknowledge that the conversation is about to end. "Oh, sorry, I'll let you go," would be one option. For specific future events the person could say, "Thanks, I think I will/I'll do my best/I'll see you soon/I'll talk to you soon." If this turn does not acknowledge the conversation-ending move, however, the person's attempt to close the conversation will fall flat. The person who has to leave may feel ignored and sucked into a conversation when they'd rather be somewhere else. The less direct the ending move (especially with language learners), however, the more likely the conversation partner won't notice it. By contrast, if at this point the conversation partner simply says "Okay, bye!" their farewell will come across as needlessly abrupt.
Typically after the ending move has been acknowledged, you will find another turn by the person who initiated the conversation-ending moves. This will be something like "Take care!" or "Yeah, see you!" This move is basically without content and serves only to confirm the fact that this person has no further topics to propose and the conversation can end safely. The other person then responds to this with "You too" or something similar, indicating that indeed, he/she has no further content to propose either. This is the spot where if someone has forgotten to say something, it may be introduced.
Following these moves (social/phatic moves) that are simply redundant indicators that it's okay to end the conversation, that's when we get the actual goodbyes. A goodbye is a speech act that functions to end the conversation. The moves of the last turn ("take care") can sometimes be interpreted or used as goodbyes, but for myself, I never quite feel like I've really put a button on the conversation without an official "bye!" This is another possible complication. Proposing a new topic at this point is a bit more unexpected and sometimes people will actually apologize for it (where they are less likely to earlier).
Those of you familiar with Instant Message conversations may notice that you often have to do this goodbye sequence twice. The delay in IM chats introduces the (relatively likely) possibility that you will initiate this sequence of ending turns while someone else is still typing topic related stuff. In this circumstance, you end up with a point of conversational ambiguity. The person trying to initiate an ending sequence has the option of responding directly to the ongoing topic and then adding on a re-initiation of the ending sequence. Another option is for him/her not to respond to the existing topic material at all (but this might be considered abrupt). Sometimes the person who was typing topic information will simply drop the topic and reply with an acknowledgment of the initiating turn. Sometimes another odd option occurs and you end up conducting two entirely separate ending turn sequences, one which follows on to the first initiation of the ending sequence, and another which follows onto the remaining topic material that the second person had been typing!
By this time, this has happened to me so much that I'm starting to think there must be some kind of a story here. Or maybe not a story core element, but something I could add onto another context. I wonder if one could write a story with a split ending and have it be plausible. Hmmm...
Another point where this might be relevant to dialogue is that phatic talk, the empty stuff with which we maintain social relationships, may or may not be important to your story. If the smoothness of the relationship between the two people speaking is less important than the information conveyed, leaving the last few turns of talk out of the dialogue is certainly fine. However, if the relationship is important and you're going to play with some of the twists mentioned above to create tension, it might be to your advantage to pursue the conversation all the way through to the end.
Just sharing my thoughts, as usual!
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Three-person conversations
Three-person conversations, and any conversations involving more than two people, are notoriously difficult to write. Who are the main people in the conversation? Does everyone participate equally? How do I keep the third person in the reader's awareness when they're not saying anything, so they don't appear to come out of the blue when they do speak?
These are all good questions, and I've struggled through them just like everyone else, but I thought I'd share a few thoughts on the subject.
When I'm coming into any conversation, I want to make sure I start out knowing precisely the mood, motives, and voice/conversational style of each participant. This is critical even in a two-person conversation, because without this information, it's easy to have characters say things that the author wants them to say in order to get a story task accomplished - and if they're accomplishing author tasks, they won't come alive as characters and the whole conversation will fall flat.
Here are some questions you might want to answer about each person in the room where a conversation will take place:
How does this character feel (general mental state)?
How does this character judge each other person in the room?
What does this character want from each other person in the room?
What is this character's goal/purpose in the conversation?
What might this character stand to gain or lose depending on the success of the interaction?
And some voice and style questions:
Does this character feel comfortable speaking to others? In front of others?
Does this character enjoy or despise interruptions (or interrupt and hate to be interrupted?)?
Some of the answers to these questions won't just depend on the identity of the speaker, but also can change depending on circumstance. This is why it's so important to know how the speaker judges the other people in the room - a person asking a friend for something casual will speak differently from a person asking a colleague for an illicit favor in the presence of their boss.
Here are some examples of three-person situations.
1. Two people are talking to each other when another person arrives on the scene and tries to join in.
2. One person goes to ask a favor of another and brings a friend along for moral support.
3. Two people are talking when another arrives and decides that one of them has it all wrong and it's his job to explain the situation properly.
4. Two people are talking but a third is nearby and starts making relevant comments to indicate to the two that they're being overheard.
5. Two people are talking to each other and a third realizes that they aren't understanding each other at all, and tries to intervene to change the balance of their conversation (this happens in Cold Words between Rulii, Hada and Majesty).
In all of these situations, it's good to keep track of who the primary speakers are, and of the nature of the third's involvement. Each speaker will make conversational moves to align him or herself with the others, for particular reasons. A speaker will speak differently if she is intending her message to be heard by two people rather than one.
In my fantasy novel, for example, there's a situation in which my protagonist Dana's mother calls her on the telephone. This is ostensibly a two-person interaction, but because of the way the mother talks, halfway through the conversation Dana figures out that the mom is also making a show for Dana's sister, who is standing by invisibly on the other end of the phone. The cues to this are subtle - the mother makes comments about Dana's situation that are not quite fully appropriate to her, but have some ambiguity.
One thing to remember is that conversations aren't always entirely focused. A third person can interject something particularly relevant to their own situation, and the conversation can go in that direction for three or four turns, and then come back to where it was. Or someone can be distracted by thoughts of a third person in the middle of the interaction and become confused, as in the following example:
Evan turned to me. "Dana, what's this rumor I'm hearing about my dad?"
That took me by surprise. "Oh, well, he was looking for you, I think. But I told him if he wanted to see fireworks he should go down to the quad."
Above Evan's head, the first rally of fireworks soared up, blooming like flowers. I searched for Brian in the brightness but I couldn't see him. Thunder thudded into my ears.
"Yeah, well he's not here," Evan said.
I looked at him. "What?"
"My dad. He's not here."
This brings me to the issue of keeping track of a non-participant or low-level participant in a conversation. I have to admit that point of view and internalization do wonders in this regard. Even if a participant isn't speaking much, so long as the POV character cares about what he thinks, looks at him, or otherwise notices his presence, the reader won't lose track of him.
These are my thoughts at the moment, but I welcome questions and discussion to push the topic further.
These are all good questions, and I've struggled through them just like everyone else, but I thought I'd share a few thoughts on the subject.
When I'm coming into any conversation, I want to make sure I start out knowing precisely the mood, motives, and voice/conversational style of each participant. This is critical even in a two-person conversation, because without this information, it's easy to have characters say things that the author wants them to say in order to get a story task accomplished - and if they're accomplishing author tasks, they won't come alive as characters and the whole conversation will fall flat.
Here are some questions you might want to answer about each person in the room where a conversation will take place:
How does this character feel (general mental state)?
How does this character judge each other person in the room?
What does this character want from each other person in the room?
What is this character's goal/purpose in the conversation?
What might this character stand to gain or lose depending on the success of the interaction?
And some voice and style questions:
Does this character feel comfortable speaking to others? In front of others?
Does this character enjoy or despise interruptions (or interrupt and hate to be interrupted?)?
Some of the answers to these questions won't just depend on the identity of the speaker, but also can change depending on circumstance. This is why it's so important to know how the speaker judges the other people in the room - a person asking a friend for something casual will speak differently from a person asking a colleague for an illicit favor in the presence of their boss.
Here are some examples of three-person situations.
1. Two people are talking to each other when another person arrives on the scene and tries to join in.
2. One person goes to ask a favor of another and brings a friend along for moral support.
3. Two people are talking when another arrives and decides that one of them has it all wrong and it's his job to explain the situation properly.
4. Two people are talking but a third is nearby and starts making relevant comments to indicate to the two that they're being overheard.
5. Two people are talking to each other and a third realizes that they aren't understanding each other at all, and tries to intervene to change the balance of their conversation (this happens in Cold Words between Rulii, Hada and Majesty).
In all of these situations, it's good to keep track of who the primary speakers are, and of the nature of the third's involvement. Each speaker will make conversational moves to align him or herself with the others, for particular reasons. A speaker will speak differently if she is intending her message to be heard by two people rather than one.
In my fantasy novel, for example, there's a situation in which my protagonist Dana's mother calls her on the telephone. This is ostensibly a two-person interaction, but because of the way the mother talks, halfway through the conversation Dana figures out that the mom is also making a show for Dana's sister, who is standing by invisibly on the other end of the phone. The cues to this are subtle - the mother makes comments about Dana's situation that are not quite fully appropriate to her, but have some ambiguity.
One thing to remember is that conversations aren't always entirely focused. A third person can interject something particularly relevant to their own situation, and the conversation can go in that direction for three or four turns, and then come back to where it was. Or someone can be distracted by thoughts of a third person in the middle of the interaction and become confused, as in the following example:
Evan turned to me. "Dana, what's this rumor I'm hearing about my dad?"
That took me by surprise. "Oh, well, he was looking for you, I think. But I told him if he wanted to see fireworks he should go down to the quad."
Above Evan's head, the first rally of fireworks soared up, blooming like flowers. I searched for Brian in the brightness but I couldn't see him. Thunder thudded into my ears.
"Yeah, well he's not here," Evan said.
I looked at him. "What?"
"My dad. He's not here."
This brings me to the issue of keeping track of a non-participant or low-level participant in a conversation. I have to admit that point of view and internalization do wonders in this regard. Even if a participant isn't speaking much, so long as the POV character cares about what he thinks, looks at him, or otherwise notices his presence, the reader won't lose track of him.
These are my thoughts at the moment, but I welcome questions and discussion to push the topic further.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)