Expressing Motion

[Creed]

A while ago there was a post on the Mythic Scribes article page about dialogue and how to make it more engaging. The article used some Game of Thrones televisual examples to describe the technique of including actions that parallel, contrast, or alter the nature of the conversation. GoT has some wonderful scenes with symbology (such as Tywin Lannister skinning and gutting a stag while talking to his son) and apparent metaphors (the article cited a conversation between two characters who did not trust each other: they were drinking tea, and Ned found the drink much too sweet (i.e. he was put off by honeyed words)).

I think that's a very powerful concept, and one that can be applied here.

Most of the minute, floating descriptors are things I might include in a first draft, and then weed out. Hands and feet are pretty telling in real life, however, so as in the examples above like Devor's, the hands are actually pulling their weight. There's a reason Shakespeare described what characters were doing with their hands so often.

There's also that rule about every scene needing to accomplish at least one of three things: advancing plot, deepening character, exploring world. It can be kinda used on the micro scale. The example cited in the OP is an uninteresting play-by-play (from the outside) and it seems to exist just to keep the scene grounded in visual space. So...

If you want to be visual and make a movie in your reader's head, I'd suggest leaning more towards the Game of Thrones method of making the actions purposive. Steerpike's example is in line with this: Unless your goal is to show me a character's reliance on habit/processes, I don't need to understand their morning routine.So it can be condensed/cut. The stroke example is also interesting. Walking through doors and putting down mugs is not, unless the door is particularly foreboding or you're slamming down the mug.

 

[R Snyder]

Detail, Detail

A post came across my dash on tumblr yesterday that really struck me as emblematic of what I strongly dislike about contemporary writing styles.



(Profanity removed by me. Original post I read.)

At first I thought to myself, "yeah, it's a real pain". And then I stopped and thought about it and realized that all of this was thinking visually about storytelling in a non-visual medium. If you're filming a scene, an actor who picks up a coffee cup will have to put it down again before they can perform some other action with their hands, like opening a newspaper. But in live action, this is a natural and quick action that hardly needs to be thought about. When writing a stage play for instance, if you have a character exit stage left and you want to make them return again in the same scene from the same location, you have to remember that they exited left and not right. In visual storytelling, these things matter. Because you are feeding the visuals to the audience, you are responsible for making sure the visual action flows and maintains continuity.

However, I would argue that it is very different in literary storytelling. In literary storytelling you are providing the reader not with sights, sounds, tastes, etc. but with the idea of sights, sounds, tastes, etc. These things don't come to fruition until they are created by the reader's imagination in their own mind. You give them key details, the ones that help to shape the rest, and then you let the reader create the whole for themselves. This is not just how literary fiction works, it's the very appeal of the written story.

And after giving it some thought, I think that this not only includes those physical attributes of places and characters, but to the very motion within the scene as well. If you write that a character takes a sip of coffee and then later that the character opens the newspaper, you don't have to describe the action of picking up and putting down the coffee cup. Because it's obvious from the context that this must happen and it's easy for the reader to picture without needing to be told. This applies to any sort of mundane actions that naturally follow from the context of some larger action. Unless the small actions are performed in a particular way that is mean to convey character information, these normal rote motions are so ingrained in us that it is easy to fill in the blanks. You don't need to describe every motion.

And describing all those mundane motions ("he opened the door, walked through the door, walked across the room, sat down in the chair..." etc.) is just tedious to the reader, I believe. I find the same thing tedious in fight scenes. Every time the writer describes in minute detail every motion of the body during a fight, my brain starts to turn off. I've seen enough movies that I can fill in those details too. In this day and age, almost everyone has. There's no point in cluttering up your writing with needless description even of motion.

I think this happens because writers seem to have a camera in their heads. Movies are so ingrained in us these days that writers automatically start writing stories the way a camera films them. They try and capture in words everything a camera can show. But you'd need a thousand words to fully express one image, to reverse the old saying. Written stories aren't meant to be told that way. Written stories, I feel, should focus on what words can express that a camera can't. Writers should understand the strengths and limitations of their medium instead of trying to use words like a camera.

Instead of trying to express every small motion and adding them all together into a larger motion, go right to expressing the meaning behind the motion, the whole that's larger than the sum of it's parts. Words can do that where images can't. Writers have embraced "Show don't Tell as a mantra. But consider that this advice makes more sense in visual storytelling. Where you almost never want to have "talking head" scenes where the characters are simply telling you information. Embrace the reality that words have the ability to show AND to tell. Words can say "he searched the room with exacting precision" rather than having to spend 30 seconds with an actor performing the search. Words can say "she was a collector of rare books" rather than having to pan over a bookcase of leather bound spines or create dialogue where someone says "So, you're a collector of rare books?" "Why yes, I am" or some such. Words can do A LOT that images can't, but it seems like few writers these days are aware or use words to their best advantage.

Well, that was long. Anyway, thoughts? Opinions?

That was long, but well written and your thought (what you strongly dislike) came through in good shape. One of my favorite literary figures, is the great William Goldman. (There are a few youtube videos that are fun to watch. The guy is so straight forward.) He's written novels and screenplays, of writing -- I believe it was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid -- he said he wrote it as a screenplay because he didn't want to have to write, to deal with, 'all the mechanical shit'. Getting characters on and off horses and in and out of rooms and so on. Let other people write that stuff.

You say 'words can do A LOT that images can't' and I reflexively think: A picture is worth a thousand words. When writing a scene, how much detail is required? Sometimes a lot but generally, less is more. It can be tedious, unnecessary, and bog things down. My favorite author is James Lee Burke (for his Dave Robicheaux novels), and I re-read a few of his books every year. Next time I read one I'll pay attention to the mechanics of characters sitting and picking things up but my overall perception is that it is minimal, and natural. Definitely something to think about and be aware of.

Contemporary writing styles . . . I don't read as much as I used to and when I do, I'm just as likely to seek out something I read and enjoyed a decade or so ago. Or I'll check to see if Kazuo Ishiguro has written anything new. I do poke around and I believe that there is a lot of really bad writing and storytelling going on, but maybe it's always been like that.