Understanding The Silent Language
Summary of "Dialogue" by Robert McKee
📚 Dialogue is a must-read for fiction writers.
🕒 Save time by reading my comprehensive summary.
My summary is broken into four posts:
Part 1: Dialogue is action
Part 2: Understanding the silent language
Here is Part 2:
In life, people “speak” to each other from beneath their words.
A silent language flows below conscious awareness.
In fiction, this is the difference between text and subtext:
Text - The surface of a work of art (AKA words on the page of a novel)
Subtext - The inner substance of a work of art (AKA the meaning and feeling that flow below the surface)
For Example:
If Character A says to Character B: “Oh look, you’ve lost weight!”
In the text, Character A’s actions compliment Character B.
In the subtext, Character A could be doing anything from encouraging to seducing to taunting to insulting Character B.
When you write a line of dialogue, consider what action the character is taking beneath their words.
Remember, there is a reason for everything we do.
Consider ice cream 🍦
We never eat ice cream simply because we’re hungry, right?
Like all behaviors, a conscious or subconscious action underlies this activity.
The same is true of talk.
Good dialogue creates a kind of transparency.
The text of a character’s spoken words conceals his inner life from other characters, while at the same time allowing the reader to see through the surface of his behavior.
Try to write at two levels:
Surface meaning: what the speaker hopes other characters will believe in and act on.
Hidden meaning: what the author hopes the reader will pick up on (often this is revealed through what characters avoid mentioning)
Continue reading my Dialogue summary:
Part 1: Dialogue is action
Part 2: Understanding the silent language
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