The Invisible College Lesson Six: A Note on Style
May 21, 2017
A dive into how writers balance showing and telling through vivid images, spare dialogue, and tiny sensory details. Discussions range from crafting character through speech and action to using omission and subtext for tension. There is also a look at when deliberate telling enhances mythic or fairy-tale moods and examples of playful rule-breaking in narrative style.
AI Snips
Chapters
Books
Transcript
Episode notes
Show Character Through Action Not Explanation
- Isaac Bashevis Singer advises to give images and events rather than explanations to reveal character.
- He recommends avoiding long emotional descriptions and showing actions to convey psychology.
Let Dialogue And Action Define Characters
- Elmore Leonard tells writers not to over-describe appearance and to let speech and action define a character.
- He warns against using verbs other than "said" or adding adverbs to dialogue tags.
Use Tiny Sensory Details To Convey Feeling
- Ernest Hemingway suggests conveying experience through small concrete details of action and sensation.
- He advises writers to notice and record precise, sensory moments to make readers feel the same emotions.
