Dialogue can be an exciting part of the writing process. Once you get your characters’ voices right, they can almost take off on their own. Put them in a room with each other and they start revealing themselves, even to you.

Getting dialogue right can take some work. There is the historical time and place to consider, the character’s background, age and emotions, and their relationship with the other characters. Hammett used to go to some lengths to get the vocabulary, slang and intonations of his criminals just right, walking the seedy streets of San Francisco and hanging out in speakeasies (that was his excuse, anyway) taking down notes.

Recording the way people actually speak, however, does not necessarily work on the page. I once heard a writer talking about the editing process for his first novel with some frustration, explaining how the editors had asked him to change the dialogue of one of his characters. According to the author, the character was based on a real person in the same difficult situation, and she actually said that. Clearly, however, in the context of the novel, the editors didn’t consider that that piece of dialogue worked. The problem of credibility is more of an issue in fiction than in real life. We are more likely to accept actual tragic and comic events –these days often evidenced by film footage in the press – than we are when reading an implausible plot in a work of fiction.

Most of our everyday speech needs a good edit to make interesting reading. The reader doesn’t really need all the ums and ahs that we punctuate our every day exchanges with, or meaningless repetitions: “Yeah, I said, like, you know, that he
was, like, so yesterday, yeah?” Similarly, you don’t want to include the standard padding and question/answer format we use in so many conversations.

“Hello. How are you? You look well,” I said
“Good, Good. You? What’s been happening?”
“Oh, not much. You know. Busy at work.”
“Oh, I know what you mean,” she said. “How are the kids?”
“Good. Mary’s loving high school and Dave’s on the footy team now.”
“That’s good,” she said. “I’ve been meaning to have you over. What about
next weekend?”
“We can’t, I’m afraid. My parents are here.”
She put on that faux-sympathetic face and lowered her voice. “How’s that
going?”
“We’re getting a third opinion. A specialist. One doctor said there was no
point operating and the other said he wanted to try removing it. Mum’s being
brave, but she’s frail as a bird. Sleeps half the day.”

The first five and a half lines should go altogether. We all say these sort of things every day, but it makes for uninteresting reading and doesn’t add enough to the story to justify being there.

Dialogue needs to reflect plot, character and setting, but also to drive the narrative forward, revealing new details about plot or character. It is important to avoid dumping information in dialogue that you want to impart to the reader. For example:

“How is your Masters in Design degree going, Frank? I remember how much trouble you had with that lecturer, Dr Clever.”

“Good thanks, Graham. Yes, he was sacked for incompetence after I wrote a letter to the Dean detailing the long list of mistakes he made in the paper we were supposed to be writing together and which he submitted to that journal, Heraclitus Unwrapped, without checking with me about using my research for his paper, and how the whole thing nearly ruined my reputation in the department. Now we have Professor Smart, who transferred from the University of Wollongong, I’m enjoying it much more. I should complete the course by the end of the year.”

The above sounds awkward and unnatural. Frank and Graham are not really talking to each other but acting as puppets for the author to get a whole lot of information across to the reader. If these details are crucial to the story, a few sentences of exposition can be more economical and effective way to reveal most of them. Alternatively, you could use a mixture of exposition and dialogue that more effectively mimic speech and reflects and reveals character. Good writers of dialogue don’t have the characters saying any more than they need to, and certainly don’t have them dumping a whole lot of information into their dialogue in the self-conscious way mimicked above. The following is a great example from Carey’s novel Theft, in which an artist is talking to a dealer about having his work photographed for a catalogue:

“I will have it photographed,” he said, “if that would help.”
“I’ll need a ten by eight.”
“Relax, my friend.”
You prick, I thought, don’t tell me to relax, you fucking thief.
“You shall have your ten by eight.”
When he says “shall” and “shan’t” he is pretending that he and his old man never came from Antwerp on a ten-pound migrant ticket, that they never built shearing sheds and ate cockatoos for their dinner. So where did all this “shall” and “shan’t” shit come from? Suddenly he sounded like old Lady Wilson hiring her shearers – Did you shar har last yar? No? Then you shan’t shar har this yar.
I asked Jean-Paul: “When shall I have my ten by eight?”
“Tomorrow,” he said, his eyes narrowing.

There’s no fat on this dialogue, no “he mumbled, laconically” to emphasise the humour or tone. It has all been cut away. The remaining words have been carefully chosen for the nuance they impart. Impeccable comic timing gives this small passage real impact. Note, too, the contrast between what is said and what is thought, a great tool for revealing character and unspoken conflicts.

Tips for writing or editing dialogue:

• Less is usually more.
• Avoid straightforward question/answer format.
• Consider the conflicts and motivations of your characters (eg. what is each character trying to get out of the conversation?).
• Choose words and expressions to reflect character’s background, personality and emotions.
• Make sure each of your characters sound different when you read their speech aloud.

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