>> One of the ways which we got to know our characters is what they say as well as
what they do.
So for you, how do you create memorable dialogue?
What goes into a scene and
some dialogue that you hope the reader will never forget?
>> I think we'd actually had a conversation about this last week where we
were talking about, with some of the students here at Wesleyan,
about dialogue and that dialogue should ideally two things.
It should deepen our understanding of character or advance the plot.
More specifically, I think it was a playwright I read somewhere that said
dialog is what characters do to one another.
And I like that word, do.
I like that sort of, that active condition.
The idea that dialog is not backstory, dialog isn't recitation of,
this is everything that's happened in the story up to now.
Dialog isn't a place where you sort of feed all of the mechanics of
what a writer wants to tell in the story.
Dialogue is something that's organic.
Dialogue is something that should be happening
in the moment between two characters.
It should be an exchange, really.
Basically, it should be like a barter,
like one character's trying to get something from someone else.
And so the dialogue is their tool to get,
whether it's an object, or a kind of concession in some way.
Dialogue is something that's active.
And I know this is something that I talk about with my students in my class and
something I'll talk about in my module about plot,
is that you need rising action in a story.
And dialogue is a really excellent place to convey a rising action to the reader.
So by rising action I mean, you are escalating the situation in a way that
makes it interesting for the reader and forces your character to figure a way out.
To figure a way out of this conversation that they're in.
So I think it's really important to keep in mind that dialogue is not a place for
exposition.
It's not a place for regurgitating everything that’s happen in the story for,
it's active, it moves the story forward.