Let's Talk Dialogue
External and Internal Dialogue
Hey Story Crafters,
After you create characters your readers want to care about, the next step is to give those characters a compelling voice. Just as no two people speak exactly the same way, no two characters should speak the same way in your story. There might be similarities in terms of vocabulary, accent, regional dialect, etc., but the reader should be able to tell which character is speaking, without only relying (or, heavily relying) on dialogue tags.
In big-picture terms, there are two types of dialogue you can use: external dialogue and internal dialogue (or internal monologue).
The purpose of external dialogue, when characters speak out loud (either to themselves or to each other), is to:
Put characters in action, by providing character interaction (or just action) in a scene.
This can be through spoken dialogue, or nonverbal communication (e.g. body language).
Give insight into the relationships between characters, and show how those relationships develop—or even fall apart.
The purpose of internal dialogue (also called internal monologue), is to:
Put the reader inside a specific character’s head.
This, of course, means internal dialogue is subjective, limited to a specific character’s point of view. The reader has access to this character’s thoughts, and these thoughts color the character’s perception of the world around them.
Internal dialogue doesn’t necessarily mean the POV character shares direct thoughts (e.g. Yeah, that was definitely weird, thought Alan.) with the reader. It’s more of the POV character filtering, or narrating, the story through their voice. This voice is not the same as the writer’s voice.
Give the reader insight on a specific character’s identity and personality.
As a result, the reader gets a front row seat to a specific character’s development. This development can be character growth, or deterioration.
Both external dialogue and internal dialogue:
Give the reader insight into character.
Characters can show their personality through internal dialogue, and by how they interact (i.e. positively, negatively, or indifferently) with other characters.
Develop character.
As the story progresses, how a specific character interacts with others, or how they think, should change. Dialogue gives the reader the opportunity to evaluate whether this change is for the better or not.
Convey information to readers in order to move the story forward.
Spoken lines of dialogue, and even a specific character’s internal dialogue, should move the story forward. The topics characters choose to discuss or focus on need to be relevant to the characters’ motivations, or to the overall goal of the story. Otherwise, the reader may lose interest in the conversation, or in a character, and decide not to continue reading your story.
As long as the dialogue in your story accomplishes these goals, it’s strengthening and enhancing your storytelling. Readers don’t only want to “see” the characters they care about (appearance-wise, personality-wise, or by how their backstory shaped them). Readers also want to “hear” how these characters speak; to each other, and inside their heads.
Feel free to share your thoughts on external and internal dialogue in the comments below.
Until next time!
Best,
Leah