Do you prefer showing or telling?
Hey! Can you guys help me find a book:
the female lead was a doctor from past era, loved a man but in an accident she died and when she woke up she was a high school girl who wants to commit suicide just because of a failure in love confession.
EternalNightLotus I actually subconsciously been doing both as well. I never had a reader complain about it, but they didn't even mention it so far. I feel like showing too much gets boring, but if you use repeating expressions, for me, I usually use something like: 'he rubbed the back of his neck' to usually show uncertainty, but that's because I've been mostly consistent with doing so.
As for the tell part, sometimes it's better to ommit long winded explanations of just obvious feelings. You'll need that same space to further the story. Since my story is written from the first person, I usually use my main character to explain what he thinks others are feeling. For example, it'd look something like this: 'I wasn't sure, but knowing him, I'd say he was more or less perplexed."
Something along those lines I'd say is decent enough. In my case, I use about 7 tells for 3 shows. maybe 6:4, I'm not sure lol But what's important, is that I use more tells, because it shortens those unnecessary words, for important informations, and plot.
Benny_Manatee I agree as every writer has their own STYLE. Which makes it unique... like a trademark.
Benny_Manatee
Nice! Thats a cool way of showing what your character is feeling, if you keep using it they will already know their thoughts without you having to say anything
- Edited
Sounds like you have your own style, which is good, but I disagree with some of this. While telling is generally the shorter option, it isn’t always. Being repetitive is a problem (unless do it intentionally for some reason), but it isn’t unique to showing.
You can mix up expressions with synonyms or by focusing on different actions the character is doing (or a different part of their actions). Being concise is just a skill you develop over time.
For example, if you have a scene where someone is nervous you can both show and tell. There is a way to do both concisely and without repetition. Also, you can be long winded and repetitive with both. Here is an example of a show and tell scene that doesn’t have “long winded explanations” or “repetitive expressions.”
- Tell
He was nervous. Before long, he grew more nervous. After five minutes, he was worse.
- Show
He was fidgeting in his seat. Before long, he started twiddling his fingers. After five minutes, he started glancing over his shoulder.
Okay, my show is a bit longer, but there is no “long winded explanation” I just adjusted things to focus on what the man is doing rather than how he is feeling. Thus, I’m showing and not telling…
Also note that my tell is more repetitive than my show. I also feel like people that tell usually aren’t as considerate because they add adjectives to try to make things seem more well-written or exciting. Usually it starts to look like this:
- Tell
He was very nervous. Before long, he grew more way more nervous. After five minutes, he was way way worse because his nervousness was increasing.
Now, it’s about the same length as the show because “filler words” were added. The reason this happens if because tells don't naturally include emotions and magnitude. With a show you can usually express things like “more nervous” by going from a small nervous twitch to a larger one. There is also emotions attached because the reader can relate to the actions that are being shown.
Similarly “it was scary” is not as scary as “it was pitch black outside” or whatever you describe. I am not great at explaining this or examples, but I hope the concept came across, haha.
Cowshed
Well, from what I know "show, don't tell" is more relevant to elements of the plot of the story, rather than descriptions.
One very common thing you will see is a character or the narrator saying something about a character instead of having a scene giving that information.
For example, if I tell you a person is impulsive, you would absorb that information, but it wouldn't particularly stick with you.
Now, if you saw that said person being impulsive, it would leave a way stronger impression on you.
That is why showing is better than telling.
I wish I could like this twice… well said.
The question should be do you prefer being shown or being told. And the answer is pretty obvious from other comments on this thread.
One thing about tell tho, sometimes you have to present a narrative summary. e.g. once upon a time, there was a kingdom in a land far far away. In that kingdom, lived a king and a queen. After trying for many years, they failed to have a child. One day, an old woman knocked on their door. Blah blah. Sort of like the premise/prologue. In that case, you need to 'tell', since there is no other way. Altho, yes, showing is always preferable in the main events of the story.
shadowdrake27 Yeah, for sure it did come across. I do agree, but those are probably great tools for a full-blown novel. I guess I'm just too used to writing webnovels at this point, that I just started to think about how to conserve my energy, and thus started to introduce repeating expressions.
I don't think that being repetitive is necessarily a bad thing, after all, how many times do you actually notice a 'he/she said' line after a dialogue? I think there's a pretty good way, to actually make use of that, just by introducing a few other words, that usually serve to explain feelings, thus using a tell, rather than a show, for example, you can use something like 'he/she shouted' instead of 'yelled' for more emotinal scenes. Also, 'cried' is a good one, to express stuff, like desperation.
I was mainly talking about stuff like that, sorry if it didn't come across fully "
Yeah strong verbs make a huge difference. Repetition can actually be good in a story if it’s done intentionally/correctly as well. I think that I understand better what you are saying though.
Seems like there is a bit of a misunderstanding of “show” vs “tell” though. A character “crying” something is showing. Descriptions are not the same as a tell. Because the character is crying out, their actions are conveying emotions (a show). Perhaps I’m over thinking this though.
- tell:
“Why are you doing this to me?” He said in a very sad tone because he was sad.
- show:
“Why are you doing this to me?” He cried as he sobbed uncontrollably.
shadowdrake27 I'm glad you do now! :D
Okay, I'm going to disagree here. I'm going to use your example, but essentially, I think we're just using a different meaning to the word 'crying'.
I'm using merriam-webster for this.
transitive verb
1: to utter loudly : SHOUT
He cried "Wait!" but it was too late.
2archaic : BEG, BESEECH
3: to proclaim publicly : ADVERTISE
cry their wares
intransitive verb
1: to call loudly : SHOUT
She cried out for help.
2: to shed tears often noisily : WEEP, SOB
The child began to cry after she dropped her ice-cream cone.
3: to utter a characteristic sound or call
heard the seagulls crying
4: to require or suggest strongly a remedy or disposition (see DISPOSITION sense 2b)
… there are a hundred things which cry out for planning …
— Roger Burlingame
I'm using the first meaning of the intransitive meaning most often, not as in shedding tears, rather as a shout.
My example would be then:
tell:
“Why are you doing this to me?” He cried out to his enemy.
show:
“Why are you doing this to me?” The veins popped out of his neck, as he was using all his energy to conjure up one last breath.
Is this more understandable here?
As for your exact example, yes, I entirely agree. In that way, cry definitely would be more of a show.
- Edited
Our examples seem the same to me, but I understand what you are saying. You can cry out in anger or sadness, but the meaning on the word doesn’t change. Crying also has the dual meaning of being sad and having tears flow down your face, but that’s not how I used it either.
My point was just that a show is when you tell something to a reader through a character while a tell is when the narrator states something for the reader. You don’t necessarily need to characters to be doing a lot to have something be a “show.” Even a character saying how they feel to another character can be considered showing not telling because the character is doing the work not the narrator.
In my example, the tell was the part where I wrote “he was sad” rather then the show which was “he was sobbing.” It was a very bad and unclear example haha. sorry for the confusion.
- Edited
I think in the end, it all just comes down to a slight difference in our understanding of these concepts, and probably it's also a difference of writing style... I still do write in the first person, so the line is a bit more thin. I do understand where you're coming from, tho.
Also, I'm pretty sure, that my understanding of the word 'cry' is slightly skewed, on the account of not being a native speaker (I don't know about you, tho lol). Other languages I speak probably interfere with my understanding of the word as well, take the japanaese word 泣く(naku) and 鳴く (naku) for example. They are both usually translated as 'to cry' in english, but their meanings are fundamentally different. The first one, is the human act of shedding tears, out of sadness or joy, while the second one is closer to howling (of an animal). I'm mostly using this second concept, whenever I'm using crying as an action. In that meaning, it would definitely be a tell, and not a show, even though I tend to use it as a show... I know, it barely makes any sense lol I try to use it to convey emotional yelling, rather than just the act of any standard yelling (i.e. when you'd just yell to the other side of the room, compared to yell at someone out of anger).
I know it barely makes sense lol sorry for any confusion...
Edit: I also have to add, that I'm not using the fact that I'm a non-native english speaker as an excuse, I'm using it as an objective observation for weirdness in my language. I actively do my best to fix these weird issues.
Show when the scene merits that investment (which should be most scenes), but just get going and start telling when you're fast forwarding.
So, James had a really awful shouting match with his girlfriend (I hope this scene was shown), and now he's in a taxi headed for the airport where he knows it's time for round two with his ex-wife.
Don't bloody show junk from that taxi ride. Sure, it's a scene, but it's just a transition between two scenes where he gets his arse handed to him from two different women.
For half an hour in the back seat of a car that might have been luxurious ten years earlier James slowly fumed with anger until he finally calmed down. Still, if was with a feeling of dread that he paid the driver knowing what waited just inside the glass door.
So, get over it, telling kept it short, and now we're ready for round two of verbal abuse. And yes, that one should be shown ;)
I respect your skill in writing even more knowing you do it in more than one language. English is my only language. Subtle differences may exist in our style, but overall we think about this similarly.
Also, “crying” or “crying out” is thought to be emotional in English. We call this a “strong verb” which is a verb that carries more specific meaning than a normal verb. You can think of it as a verb and adjective together so the adjective can be eliminated (emotional yelling becomes crying). Another example is “sprinting.”
Sprinting = running as fast as you can while expending maximum energy (usually over a short distance).
Crying = yelling with strong emotion in your voice.
This isn’t really related to showing vs telling, but it’s another good tool for a writer to know about. I’m not sure if it exists in every language, but I would imagine it does. Strong verbs always sound better than a weak verb with an adjective or additional description.
Sorry, I’m just rambling at this point…
That's actually some strong advice right there lol I do appreciate it! I mean, I've never heard about strong words so far, so I'm definitely going to look into them!
If you look into them in English they might also be called “powerful verbs” and it’s not the grammatical definition of strong verbs. I figured I would clarify because strong verbs have a different meaning in grammar specifically. This does also exist in other languages as well, if a quick internet search is to be trusted, haha.