Show And Tell: Which Is Better?
by Crawford Kilian
Novice writers (and some professionals) often fall into the trap of
``expositing'' information instead of presenting it dramatically.
Sometimes exposition is inevitable, or even desirable. Lloyd Abbey, in
his brilliant SF novel The Last Whales, gives us exactly one line of
human dialogue; his characters, all being whales, can't speak to one
another, so the narrator must tell us what they think and do. Gabriel
Garca Marquez can also write superb exposition for page after page.
Most of us ordinary mortals, however, need to dramatize our characters
and their feelings. Otherwise our readers will tire of our editorials.
Consider the following expository and dramatic passages. Which more
adequately conveys what the author is trying to show to the reader?
Vanessa was a tall woman of 34 with shoulder-length red hair and a pale
complexion. She often lost her temper; when she did, her fair skin turned a
deep pink, and she often swore. She was full of energy, and became impatient
at even the slightest delay or impediment to her plans. Marshall, her chief
assistant, was a balding, mild-mannered, nervous man of 54 who was often
afraid of her. He was also annoyed with himself for letting her boss him
around.
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Vanessa abruptly got up from her desk. A shaft of sunlight from the
window behind her seemed to strike fire from her long red hair as she
shook her head violently.
``No, Marshall! God damn it, this won't do! Didn't I make myself
clear?''
``Yes, Vanessa, b-but--''
``And you understood what I told you, didn't you?'' Her pale skin was
flushing pink, and Marshall saw the signs of a classic outburst on the
way. She took a step toward him, forcing him to look up to meet her
gaze; she must be a good three inches taller. He raised his hands in
supplication, then caught himself and tried to make the gesture look
like the smoothing of hair he no longer had. He felt sweat on his bald
scalp.
``Vanessa, it was a--''
``It was another one of your screw-ups, Marshall! We're committed to a
Thursday deadline. I'm going to make that damn deadline, whether or
not you're here to help me. Now, am I going to get some cooperation
from you, or not?''
Marshall nodded, cursing himself for his slavish obedience. Fifty-four
years old, and taking orders from a bitch twenty years younger. Why
didn't he just tell her to shove it?
``All the way, Vanessa. We'll get right on it.''
``Damn well better.'' Her voice softened; the pink faded from her
cheeks. ``Okay, let's get going.''
Comment: A paragraph of exposition has turned into a scene: the
portrayal of a conflict and its resolution. The scene has also
prepared us for further scenes. Maybe Marshall's going to destroy
himself for Vanessa, or poison her; maybe Vanessa's going to learn how
to behave better. Most importantly, the authorial judgments in the
exposition are now happening in the minds of the characters and the
mind of the reader--who may well agree with Marshall, or side with
Vanessa.
Here's another example:
Jerry was 19. Since leaving high school a year before, he had done
almost nothing. He had held a series of part-time jobs, none of them
lasting more than a few weeks. His girl friend Judy, meanwhile, was
holding down two summer jobs to help pay for her second year of
college. Jerry controlled her with a combination of extroverted charm
and bullying sulkiness. Secretly he envied her ambition and feared
that she would leave him if he ever relaxed his grip on her.
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``Hey, good-lookin','' Jerry said as he ambled into the coffee shop and took
his usual booth by the window.
``Hi,'' said Judy. She took out her order pad.
``Hey, I'm real sorry about what I said last night. I was way outa
line.''
``Would you like to order?''
``Hey, I said I was sorry, all right? Gimme a break.''
``That's fine. But Murray says not to let my social life get in the
way of my job. So you've got to order something for a change.''
He snorted incredulously. ``Hey, I'm broke, babe.''
She stared out the window at the traffic. ``You can't hang out here
all day for the price of a cup of coffee, Jerry. Not any more. Murray
says he'll have to let me go if you do.''
``Well, tell him to get stuffed.''
``Jerry, be reasonable. I can't. I need this job.''
``Christ, you already got the job at the movie theatre.''
``That's nights, and it hardly pays anything. I've got my whole second
year at college to pay for this summer. Jerry, maybe we can talk about
this after I get off work, okay?''
``Yeah, right. See you Labor Day, then.''
``Jerry, don't be a smartass. See you at four, okay?''
He got up, shrugging. ``Yeah, sure. Guess I'll go over to the bus
station and read comic books until then.'' He glared at her. ``Don't be
too nice to the guys who come in here. I find out you been fooling
around with anybody, you know you're in trouble, right?''
``Right, Jerry. I'm really sorry. See you later.''
Comment: Again we have a conflict that promises to lead to
further conflicts and their resolution. We want to know if Judy will
ditch Jerry, or Jerry will smarten up. Their relationship reveals
itself through their dialogue, not through the author's
editorializing.
Note that both these examples involve a power struggle. Someone is
determined to be the boss, to get his or her way. Most scenes present
such a struggle: someone decides on pizza or hamburgers for dinner,
someone chooses the date for D-Day, someone comes up with the winning
strategy to defeat the alien invaders or elect the first woman
president. We as readers want to see the resources thrown into the
struggle: raw masculinity, cynical intelligence, subtle sexual
manipulation, political courage, suicidal desperation.
Depending on which resources win, we endorse one myth or another about
the way the world operates: that raw masculinity always triumphs, that
political courage leads nowhere, and so on. Of course, if we are
writing ironically, we are rejecting the very myths we seem to
support. By using raw macho bullying mixed with a little self-pity,
Jerry seems to win his power struggle with Judy. But few readers would
admire him for the way he does it, or expect him to succeed in the
long term with such tactics.
Think carefully about this as you develop your scenes. If your hero
always wins arguments in a blaze of gunfire, he may become awfully
tiresome awfully fast. If your heroine keeps bursting into tears, your
readers may want to hand her a hankie (better yet, a towel) and tell
her to get lost. Ideally, the power struggle in each scene should both
tell us something new and surprising about the characters, and hint at
something still hiding beneath the surface--like the insecurity that
underlies Jerry's and Vanessa's bullying.
Except from "Advice on Novel Writing by Crawford Kilian."
About the Author
Crawford
Kilian was born in New York City in 1941. He moved to Canada in 1967
and now resides in Vancouver B.C. Crawford has had twelve science
fiction and fantasy novels published. He has been nominated for an
Aurora Award 3 times for his novels Eyas, Lifter and Rogue Emperor- A
Novel of the Chronoplane Wars. His latest contribution to SF is a
non-fiction book for would-be SF writers called Writing Science Fiction
and Fantasy. Crawford has two more novels in the works.
To learn more about him at Wikipedia.
Crawford Kilian Books at Amazon
