The Technique of Fiction Writing

by Robert Saunders Dowst

The process must not be carried beyond the bounds of naturalness. A mannerism of speech may be too pronounced, in that it tends to arrest a reader's attention and distract it from the flow of the story. Unnecessarily distorted spelling, for instance, employed in an attempt to be too strictly phonetic, will call attention to itself rather than individualize the speaker, that is, it will destroy the illusion of the story. "Yuh" for "you" is an instance. We all "yuh" more or less, I think, and for the writer of a story to insist thus pedantically on strict phonetic accuracy tends to make the whole fiction labored and unnatural. The whole trick is to suggest any particular distortion, and yet to have the words as intelligible for a reader as if the spelling were normal.

Mispronunciation, of course, is not the only mannerism of speech that may be availed of. In fact, the tendency is to abuse it. An open ear toward the casual talk he hears will give the writer many useful hints, and so will reading the work of others.

The speech of class and class varies, as does the speech of man and man. A lawyer in a story should be distinguishable from a sailor by the very content of his vocabulary. So should a doctor from an engineer or a brakeman, or a musician from an artist. But it must all be done naturally. The writer cannot drag in by the ears technical terms of any profession solely that a reader may be informed indirectly of the speaker's profession. But a doctor or lawyer, for instance, will generally be in a story because it requires the presence of a lawyer or doctor, and therefore the story will offer opportunity for him to reveal his place in society by his speech. Incidentally it may be noted that this matter emphasizes the necessity that the writer of fiction be observant in life and omnivorous in reading. He should know the manner of speech of any considerable class of men. It is true, of course, that no two lawyers talk precisely alike, but it is also true that it is possible to suggest a lawyer speaking by a proper choice of words, and that is the thing to do, naturally and unobtrusively. If the speech of a character is individualized in some manner, and if, in addition, a reader can gather his business or profession from his words, he will gain much in reality and definition.

The content of the talk of the characters of a story, then, should reveal their inner natures, and their idiosyncrasies of utterance and word-choice should be devised and set down to intensify the impression of their individuality initiated by the writer's strictly descriptive touches. Characterization is a double process, and neither aspect of it should be neglected, whether the writer is narrating, describing, or transcribing speech.

CHARACTERIZATION BY STATEMENT

So far as characterization by direct statement is a matter of individualizing the persons of a story as mere physical objects, apart from their inner natures, it has been discussed in stating the technique of the description of persons. It was there stated that the writer's endeavor should be to catch and fix in words the most salient attribute of the character. And usually it will be the case that a person's most striking physical attribute will have relation to some fact of his spirit, as in Stevenson's description Villon's sensual face hints of his sensual soul. The fact serves to make more obvious the truth that characterization is a double process of individualizing superficially and of revealing the person's nature, and Stevenson's description of the medieval French poet is an instance of how the writer of fiction may attain both ends in a single phrase, and avoid the suggestion of artificiality in directly stating that a character is good or bad or brave or cowardly, as the case may be. Instead of stating that Villon was sensual and cruel, Stevenson states that the wolf and pig struggled in his face. A reader sees the man's face and comprehends his nature, and comprehends the spiritual fact the more thoroughly because reaching it inferentially from a mere picture. The point is worth noting.

However, the writer of fiction frequently must state his characters' moral attributes directly. Not all conceivable persons wear their souls in their faces; if some ruddy, bluff old gentleman is a villain at heart, the writer can only say so, unless he is willing to depend wholly on the revelation of spirit worked by the character's deeds. And sometimes such a revelation comes too near the end for the other purposes of the story. Much of the interest or suspense of a tale may depend upon the reader having knowledge of the natures of the people who struggle with one another singly or in groups. Or direct statement as to a character's nature may be necessary to emphasize the significance of his acts. Stevenson's "The Ebb Tide" is an example. The book is concerned with the unavailing struggle of a weak man to be other than weak, and the author prefaces the course of events with a thumbnail biography of the weakling that invests the progress of the story with something of the inevitability of fate. The method is a favorite one of Stevenson's, and is employed in most of his longer work. Each brief sketch is directed to bring out the character's trait or traits of significance in the story, and the whole fiction gains point thereby. Turgenieff composed a biography of each of his characters to deepen and clarify his own realization of them, and incorporation in a story of a swift and significant sketch of a character's previous life likewise may serve to deepen and clarify a reader's realization of the person.

Stating directly that any person is good or bad or brave or avaricious may give a reader a key to his acts, lending them point, but direct statement is the most infirm mode of characterization. Any mere statement is less impressive and less compelling than a demonstration. And direct statement of a character's nature must be reinforced and proved by his words and deeds. It is difficult enough at best to invest a fictitious person with reality, and the writer can afford to neglect no device.

As in fulfilling all other necessities of his story, in characterizing by direct statement the writer must be easy and natural. The requirement is somewhat indefinite, as stated, but real. Statement should not be too bald; a little subtlety will be profitable to employ. To state that a character is bad, simply, is too childlike, unless the story is told from the viewpoint of a child. The matter of viewpoint must always be considered in characterizing by direct statement, for obvious reasons. If the writer takes the position of an impersonal observer, to whom the souls of all characters are open, he can write pretty much as he wills. If he writes from the viewpoint of a single character, whether in the first or third person, he cannot assume too inclusive knowledge of the souls of the others. The matter has been discussed elsewhere.[N]