Webnovel.Forum

I'm not a native English, so I'm not fluent and well-versed with vocabs. So, there are three types of paragraphs when writing; Info dumps, action, and dialogue.

When writing info dumps, do you use present tense? What tense is better to use writing it? (I know people hate info dumps, me too, but it's necessary when writing eastern fantasy.)

I use past tense on the action, but is it okay to mix past and present? Or is it horrible idea?

I know what tense to write in dialogue, but I accept suggestions.

TLDR; What tense is better when writing info dumps, action, descriptive scenery?

I myself prefer past tense but my dialogues are in present. But I found it hard to show flashbacks

Cowshed

The tense you use doesn't matter, I write descriptions in the first-person present tense, I feel like it adds a cinematic feel to my Webnovel. In terms of internal monologue, I switch between past and present tense depending on whether my main character is thinking about something that has already happened or something that he's observing or processing at the time. Writing in the first person gives me that flexibility... and restriction. However, generally speaking, pick a tense and stick to it. It's maddening when authors jump between tenses. Just don't do it.

If you're writing in the third person past tense, stick to the past tense. Dialogue, however, and internal monologue can be written in the present tense.

If you're writing in the first person past tense, stick to the past tense. The same rules above apply.

If you're writing in the first person present tense, the same rules above apply, but there's a certain degree of liberty in switching between the tenses in terms of internal monologues, because such monologues don't have to be indicated, they can just be written.

I'm not entirely sure I'm being completely coherent, but I hope this helps.

Most stories, unless the author is making a deliberate choice, are told in past tense.

More important is to be very careful with info-dumps. It's much more effective to work in that exposition (the info in an info-dump) through dialogue or action

For example, rather than having the history of the world told directly by the author, it's told through dialogue as a teacher explains why the main character is failing a class. Or the main characters discover a tablet or a disk that provides proof that the way they see the world is not true.

The info provided in an info dump is all the awesome creative stuff but it dosen't connect as well if its all piled on. Doling out the info through action and dialogue makes sure that the info is important to the characters and therefore the readers

Cowshed

The answer depends more on your narrative and personal choices than a “English language rule for info dumps.” I agree with the post above that you should try to avoid info dumps. If you must use one then ask yourself if the description is happening in the past or present. Use the appropriate tense.

As for switching tenses, in general don’t. There are certain cases where you can (someone mentioned a flash beach earlier, which is a case where you can use past tense in a present tense story), but you want to mostly stick with one tense to avoid tense switching that confuses the reader.

There is no rule that dialogue is present tense by the way. It’s just very rare that someone talks in past tense in stories. Here are some examples to help you select the correct tense:

Description taking place in the past:

A long time ago, there WAS a war that DEVASTATED
the land.

Vs Description taking place in the present:

Right now, war IS DEVASTATING the land.

Now I’ll try to cover speech. Speech is tough because even if the speech happened in the past, the speech can be present tense because the speaker is talking in the present tense. You can have a speaker talking in the past tense though! It’s not ALWAYS present tense as a “rule of the English language.”

Present Speech in present tense:

“This war IS DEVASTATING the land,” he SAYS.

Past speech in present tense

“This war IS DEVASTATING the land,” he SAID.

Note that the words said didn’t change. The only thing that changed is when the words were said. Now I’m going to change that.

Present speech in past tense:

“A long time ago, there WAS a war that DEVASTATED the land,” he SAYS.

Past speech in past tense:

“A long time ago, there WAS a war that DEVASTATED the land,” he SAID.

Now we flipped the tense of the speech because the person talking is talking about the past.

Tense is all about when the subject matter happened. Anything happening now gets present tense. Anything that already happened gets past tense.

So what tense is your info dump? Whatever tense the rest of your story is going to be, probably. Unless you are starting with a flashback to give an info dump or something that makes the info dump happen at a different time than the rest of your story.