We're Starting a Deep Dive into Show, Don't Tell
This is a boring headline. It is not a boring post though!
Usually, when I talk about showing character in story rather than telling character in story, I talk about immediacy.
I show examples like this:
Showing: Carrie stumbled into the room, hands shaking, glancing behind her before ducking behind the door.
Telling: Carrie was scared when she came into the room.
You see the difference, right?
But other people who talk and write about the craft of writing also have mentioned that it’s something else, too.
“The phrase ‘show don’t tell’ is shorthand for this advice: ‘Don’t lecture your reader; she won’t believe you. Give her the story action, character thoughts, feelings, and sense impressions as the character would experience them in real life. Let her live the story for herself as she lives real life, by experience,’” Jack Bickham writes.
That last part of his quote is also about immediacy.
But the first part is about something else.
It’s about trust. It’s about letting go of control.
Writing is communication and communication? That requires more than one person (or puppy or zombie hamster).
When we write papers or essays in schools, we write formally most of the time. We write to tell, to show that we know our facts so our teachers will give us good grades.
This objective writing happens in business writing, in legal writing, in the whereas clauses of town government and in some really didactic blog posts about earning six figures a month.
Fiction isn’t like that.
In fiction feelings matter. You want to show the character’s emotions and worldview so that the reader can feel things, too, right?
“Fiction can only involve and convince and excite readers if it lets them experience the story world the way they experience real life: by taking in stimuli and drawing their own conclusions,” he writes. “In real life, you don’t walk outside in the morning and experience the start of the day with something internal like ‘Cloud cover is thikc. The temperature is 64 degrees; the humidity is 42 percent; traffic on the highway is heave; it’s late September; the postman is irritable today.’”
Instead you go outside and experience the day.
In fiction, your readers have to experience that, too.
“Your readers will not believe dry, objective lectures. They will only believe the conclusions they form from the evidence that you carefully select and present to them,” he writes.
That’s the thing.
If I write this:
Carrie was scared when she came into the room.
You might imagine this:
Carrie stumbled into the room, hands shaking, glancing behind her before ducking behind the door.
Or you might imagine this:
Carrie crawled across the threshold, hands clutching at the shag carpet fibers, whimpering.
Or this:
Carrie jumped into the room. Her whole body trembled as she searched frantically.
“I need to hide!” she whispered. “Where can I hide.
Or they might imagine nothing and shut the book because they are super bored already. You don’t want that to happen. You also don’t want them to live the wrong thing and that’s why it’s so important to selectively present that evidence that Carrie was scared.
I’m going to go into a bit of a deep dive on show vs tell these next few posts on here, but let’s talk about how to begin.
THE FIRST STEP TO SHOWING VS TELLING
The first step according to Brickman is to get into the viewpoint and not stray.
He creates four essential steps, which are:
Figuring out which character’s point of view your story is in
Imagining the big thoughts and cruicial moments that this same character is feeling during the scene as it progresses
Showing those feelings and impressions “as vividly and briefly as possible;”
Making it logical, so there should be cause and effect.
“If you’re solidly in viewpoint, you won’t be tempted to lecture readers because you will be revealing that character’s experiences rather than reviewing some abstract, objectively written data,” he writes.
So, as an example similar to what he gives, you won’t write, “I’m tall. I’m six-foot-eight inches tall.”
You would instead write something as your character experiences it. Like:
“Damn, man, you’re about to hit your head on the ceiling,” John craned his neck as I ducked into the classroom. “And these are high ceilings.”
I sighed and tried to stand up straighter. “Used to it.”
“You’ve got a forever hunch, man, don’t you? From trying not to hit your head all the time?”
“Yeah.” He had dandruff and his part was uneven. I wonder if he knew. “It’s no big.”
SHOWING THROUGH IMMERSIVE VIEWPOINT
Step 1: Choose a Telling Statement
Pick one of the following telling lines (or come up with your own):
She was nervous about the interview.
He was furious when he saw the car.
They were in love.
I was cold.
We were terrified.
He was embarrassed.
Step 2: Ask Yourself These Four Viewpoint Questions
Inspired by Bickham’s steps:
Whose scene is this? (Pick one character’s point of view.)
What are they thinking and feeling right now?
What physical or sensory impressions are they experiencing?
What is the cause-and-effect flow? What triggered this emotion or moment, and what might it lead to next?
Step 3: Rewrite the Sentence Without Telling
Now, using that character’s viewpoint, rewrite the sentence in a short paragraph (3–6 sentences), showing the emotion through:
physical sensations
body language
dialogue (internal or external, but try to make it external if you can)
setting details filtered through emotion
Telling: I was cold.
Showing:
I jammed my hands into my hoodie’s kangaroo pocket, the fabric stiff and crusted with old salt. My breath fogged the air in sharp little death clouds. Why hadn’t I grabbed my coat? Stupid. All of this was so stupid. My teeth clicked together.
“Stop clattering. The zombie hamsters will hear you,” Shaun whispered.
“They’ll hear you whispering more.” I blew on my hands.
“Whatever.”
Optional Twist: Rewrite the Same Emotion in Two Different Ways
Try showing the same emotion from two different characters. How does fear look different for a battle-hardened detective vs. a nervous seventh grader? How does being in love feel different for someone in denial vs. someone in bliss? That sort of thing.
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