Writing Basics With Squiddy And Robot Devil

Today, I'm going to do what I said I would in my Child of the Triforce review. I'm going to try to explain the concept of “showing, not telling”. I'd like to start with a clip from the show Futurama. Watch the clip before you read on, if you'd be so kind. It's six seconds long, so I'll wait for you to come back.

Oh, good, there you are! What you just watched is painfully clearly not a serious clip. But Robot Devil's statement makes a great starting point.

While reading Child of the Triforce, you'll notice that Ryuu chooses to go into extreme detail about the characters' appearances while having nothing at all going on their heads, IQ-wise or emotion-wise.

Then when they do feel emotions, it kinda comes out of nowhere. They're standing there with their mouths open like a pack of turkeys in the rain then boom, here comes some bollocks about feelings.

It's compounded when you realize that there's never any realistic displays of their emotions, just a lot of “THAT MAKES ME FEEL ANGRY!”.

For example in the third chapter, Zelda is apparently distraught over many soldiers dying. But instead of demonstrating this in a realistic fashion, he has Ryo explain:

“Princess Zelda and I walked down the red carpet-laden stairs and hallways in order to take me to my appointed room. I could tell she was still in shock by the past events, for I could see it in her ocean-blue eyes. But I could hardly blame her. This was very stressful for all of us.”

While I believe Zelda going to pieces over something like this is a load, that's not the point. The point here is that he could have described how shaken she is without outright saying that.

People who are usually this shaken up usually display symptoms of that (possibly literally shaking, for example, or being much paler than usual), and unless his readers are all in kindergarten, I would assume they'll be intelligent enough to draw the conclusion that she's very shaken up if he said something like...

“Her Majesty was chalk-white and her hands shook slightly, but her voice was admirably steady as she wished me a good night.”

Obviously that's fairly half-assed, but I managed to convey the same thing according to a friend in under half the length. And I reduced the "THAT MAKES ME FEEL ANGRY" quotient.

The point is that it seems like Ryuu has sacrificed every bit of realistic human interaction in favor of making absolutely certain no one imagines anything differently than he does, and that makes for an extremely boring read. It's also pointless, because, well...

Even if he spells out every single unnecessary detail? We aren't him. We all have different imaginations. Which means his readers can and will form different mental images no matter how much unnecessary detail he throws at us. He needs to relax and accept this, because this is not something that he's going to be able to control.

Other than that, obviously he needs to put more effort into showing their actions, thoughts, etc, in a realistic manner. This is much less difficult than it sounds, I promise. It's certainly less difficult than an eight hundred word text wall on Gravy Thor (thanks again for letting me use that, Itinimac!) explaining every last damn detail he has on his outfit.

If you're wondering how Ryuu or even you could improve on showing and not telling, I'd suggest going people-watching in a really busy area. In my experience, you can't beat the real thing.

Watch how people interact with each other and listen to how they speak to each other. To cover my ass here, though: I'm talking just day to day crap, like two friends gossiping or a couple talking about the grocery list. So don't be a creeper and focus on everything they're saying, just pay attention to body language and listen to their tones.

Also, you shouldn't stare at people for an age, because that's how you freak people out and get called a stalker. That's a Very Bad Thing. Don't do that.

Anyway, if for whatever reason this (and by “this” I of course mean a chance to observe people, not being a creeper) isn't possible, look around YouTube for videos. There's got to be at least a few that portray the emotion you want to describe on a site that large, right?

Also, something that pretty much every writer I know and respect does? Read lots of books in lots of genres by lots of different authors. You get a great grasp of different tones and styles that way. And go for fiction and non-fiction both. Which means yeah, even if it's not something you'd usually pick up, try it anyway. You never know what you'll end up finding. And if and when you do find something you like, try it while writing! But do something to make it yours.

And by that, I don't mean “just change a couple words and claim you wrote the passage”. That's plagiarism. Plagiarism is a no-no. The difference between inspiration and plagiarism/ripping things off in writing is that if you are inspired by something, people may be able to figure out who influenced you but it will not be the exact paragraph with a handful of words changed.

What this means... well, using myself for an example, because that's what's on hand? I collect books by musicians and comedians, so I've been influenced by everyone from Marilyn Manson and Nikki Sixx to George Carlin and Lewis Black. A particularly large inspiration for me is (believe it or not) Ozzy Osbourne.

However, you may or may not be able to tell that (depending on how familiar you are with the individuals; I think it's pretty clear if you're familiar with their bodies of work) because their influence is more in how I'd phrase something or in my sentence structure, not in ripping an exact passage.

To be fair, though, this isn't something you can try once or twice and go, “oh, I'm done, I've learned so much!”. If that's what you're looking for, then maybe writing isn't going to be your thing, which is perfectly fine (I'm much the same way about drawing, as it happens).

This is very much an ongoing thing. I will sit for a while in the mall or on campus even now and just listen to people chatting, and I still read literally everything that ends up in front of me. I've been writing for five years now and I'm still learning. Show-not-tell is something I still struggle with myself on occasion, in all honesty. I think everyone does.

It's something that improves with practice. But at the end of the day, doesn't that apply to everything?