Writing Mechanics: Saidisms · 3:59am Jan 22nd, 2015
Writing Mechanics
I've seen this discussion come up a couple times before, usually with passionate opinions on either side of it.
That's right. I'm gonna talk about 'saidisms.'
While "temporize" is an awesome word, I get the feeling people will start yelling about saidism abuse here.
—one of my pre-readers
Some people believe that you should only use the word said as a dialogue tag. For example:
"I used to have a spatula," Pinkie Pie said. "Until somepony used it in a stunt."
"It was an awesome stunt," Rainbow said.
Said is good. It's basic. It's kind of un-obtrusive. There's a concensus that your mind automatically filters it out after a while, so it tells you what you need to know without giving you any unnecessary information.
In essence, it's a way of turning a transcript into dialogue.
Pinkie Pie: I used to have a spatula. Until somepony used it in a stunt.
Rainbow: It was an awesome stunt.
I've even seen it misused. Hard to imagine how you could misuse a 'said' tag, but in a published work by Robert B Parker, I came across a line like this (I don't remember the exact line, and I'm not going to wade through 30 novels to find it):
"So, did you see the body?" I said.
Technically, that's correct. Spenser said that.
But most writers would say "So, did you see the body?" I asked.
The thing is, some people do notice when words are repeated. We're often warned to avoid 'word waterfalls,' where the writer keeps using the same word over and over again. Obviously, there are some cases where this is desirable:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells--
Of the bells, bells, bells--
To the sobbing of the bells ;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
—The Bells, Poe.
But in other cases it isn't so good.
Twilight put her hoof on Pinkie's hoof. Her lavender hoof complemented the baker's pink hoof. Her other three hooves were on the floor, but her right fore-hoof was resting on Pinkie's.
(It's actually harder than you'd imagine to be deliberately bad)
And I found the same thing when I was learning to write, back before half of you were even born. Hardy Boys novels had lots of saids in them. Enough that it got annoying.
Since I gave all those books away decades ago, I'm going to go and quote myself here. You'll see this passage a couple of times. I'm using this passage, since I was complemented twice in the comments on the natural flow of dialogue.
First, we're just going to do it with 'said' tags.
“Didn’t it?” Golden Harvest said. “Something went wrong up at the reservoir, and now they’ve gone and made Lyra an ambassador. You don’t think that’s connected?”
“I’m sure it is,” Cherry said. “Somehow.”
“How come she’s been up at the hospital past two days, then?” Golden Harvest said. “Huh? Tell me that.”
“Maybe she’s having a foal,” Millie said. “Maybe she went to Canterlot when her belly got big,
‘cause she dint want anypony to know.”“Somepony would’ve smelled it,” Cherry said. “And why would she want to hide it? Isn’t like when Berry Punch got knocked up.”
“As if that was a secret." Golden Harvest said. "Cormano might as well have put up a sign right in the square, as much bragging as he did.”
“What happened to him, anyway?” Millie said.
“I think he moved to Dodge Junction.” Cherry said.
“Girls!” Golden said. “Who cares about Cormano? I know why she’s been at the hospital.”
Okay. That happened.
Now, you can see there is no ambiguity to which character says something. Each bit of dialogue is clearly labelled. If you're like me, you're already getting tired of the word 'said,' if you're not, you didn't really notice it at all in the passage.
But I didn't like it when I was reading the Hardy Boys, and while I didn't have the advantage of taking a creative writing class, I did what other famous authors have done: I plagiarized. Not literally, of course—that's bad. But I paid attention to what other authors did, and copied them.
One thing I noticed was that you could dodge dialogue tags by taking advantage of the convention that there is one speaker per paragraph. As long as that character made some unambiguous motion, you didn't need a dialogue tag. The reader would guess who you were talking about.
So, going back to the quoted text:
“Didn’t it?” Golden Harvest leaned over the table. “Something went wrong up at the reservoir, and now they’ve gone and made Lyra an ambassador. You don’t think that’s connected?”
“I’m sure it is,” Cherry said. “Somehow.”
“How come she’s been up at the hospital past two days, then?” Golden Harvest glared at Cherry. “Huh? Tell me that.”
Now we've only got one said, and that's Cherry's line. We can assume that Golden Harvest delivered the other two lines, since her actions during the dialogue are specifically mentioned.
But, as Randall Munroe would say, "We can do better."
What I've always liked is putting tone into the dialogue tags. In real life, people don't speak monotone (except my college calculus professor). They have emotions, and those come out in speech.
You can do it with a single word.
“Somepony would’ve smelled it,” Cherry muttered. “And why would she want to hide it?” She looked around the tavern before continuing. “Isn’t like when Berry Punch got knocked up.”
You can add it onto a said.
“I’m sure it is,” Cherry said in a patronizing tone. “Somehow.”
Or you can illustrate it with an action.
“Girls!” Golden banged her hoof down on the table. “Who cares about Cormano?” She leaned closer to the table. “I know why she’s been at the hospital.”
Here, it's easy to imagine the passion, and possibly just a bit of irritation, in Goldie's voice.
Personally, I like variety. I like a little character-building beyond just said, said, said. But that's not for everyone, and that's okay. Writing isn't like math; there isn't one formula or one right answer. As long as your audience understands what you're saying, you're doing what you ought to.
I should also add this. You don't always need dialogue tags. Sometimes, it's pretty obvious from the flow of text who's speaking. In that case, they'll slow your reader down. Robert B Parker is very good at this: short conversations between Spenser and Hawk often don't have any tags after the first couple of exchanges. Once again, I'm not wading through 30 novels for an exact quote, so I'm going to make up my own. With ponies.
"I used to have a spatula," Pinkie Pie said. "Until somepony used it in a stunt."
"It was an awesome stunt," Rainbow said.
"It was."
"And the Cakes have, like, a hundred spatulas."
"Twenty three. But that was my spatula."
"I said I was sorry."
"My spatula. I'd had it ever since I was a filly, on the rock farm."
"You—"
"Maud gave it to me. Before she got obsessed with rocks."
Not exactly the best prose ever, but you get the idea. There are only two characters speaking, you know the first was Pinkie and the second was RD, and you can just extrapolate from there. A few other clues pin it down, like Pinkie mentioning the rock farm or Maud.
And this can work with multiple speakers, especially if it doens't really matter who said what.
“Somepony would’ve smelled it,” Cherry muttered. “And why would she want to hide it?” She looked around the tavern before continuing. “Isn’t like when Berry Punch got knocked up.”
“As if that was a secret. Cormano might as well have put up a sign right in the square, as much bragging as he did.”
“What happened to him, anyway?”
“I think he moved to Dodge Junction.”
“Girls!” Golden banged her hoof down on the table. “Who cares about Cormano?” She leaned closer to the table. “I know why she’s been at the hospital.”
You'll notice that at the end I dropped the tags. I never say who said any of the middle lines—and it doesn't matter. You already know that Golden Harvest is trying to tell her gossip, and both Cherry and Millie are interrupting with trivialities. Whether it's Cherry or Millie who says "I think he moved to Dodge Junction" is immaterial.
Finally, I should also note that vernacular can be your friend in these cases, too. That's a whole 'nother subject, with some people for it and some strongly against it. It's a good tool if you can do it well, but it does grate on some readers, in unskilled hands it's terrible, and there's a good chance you'll lose some readers. On the other hand, there are some reasonably well-known authors, like Mark Twain, who used it to add an extra layer of versimilitude to their stories.
Consider this passage:
"I cleared the sky faster than anypony ever has," Rainbow said.
"Ah'm sure you're mighty proud of yourself, sugarcube."
I really don't have to tell you AJ said the second line.
I doubt I'm going to convince a die-hard to change her ways, and that's not my intent. It's also fair to warn you that some people will be upset no matter what choice you make, and in some cases, it could cause you to be rejected by a professional publisher. If you're hoping to break into a certain genre of fiction, you'd better do your due diligence before you develop any writing habits. I've heard that mystery publishers generally don't like any dialogue tags besides 'said.'
Heck, I've been doing theatre for so long that I use commas in dialogue or descriptive text for where I feel there ought to be a pause, whether or not a comma is grammatically correct. My pre-readers will be happy to tell you all about that.
But if you're just starting out, and if it's just a hobby, I encourage you to consider what kind of dialogue tags work best for you—like anything else in writing, it's a stylistic choice an author should make for him or herself.
The full passage, as published:
“Didn’t it?” Golden Harvest leaned over the table. “Something went wrong up at the reservoir, and now they’ve gone and made Lyra an ambassador. You don’t think that’s connected?”
“I’m sure it is,” Cherry said in a patronizing tone. “Somehow.”
“How come she’s been up at the hospital past two days, then?” Golden Harvest glared at Cherry. “Huh? Tell me that.”
“Maybe she’s having a foal,” Millie offered. “Maybe she went to Canterlot when her belly got big, ‘cause she dint want anypony to know.”
“Somepony would’ve smelled it,” Cherry muttered. “And why would she want to hide it?” She looked around the tavern before continuing. “Isn’t like when Berry Punch got knocked up.”
“As if that was a secret. Cormano might as well have put up a sign right in the square, as much bragging as he did.”
“What happened to him, anyway?”
“I think he moved to Dodge Junction.”
“Girls!” Golden banged her hoof down on the table. “Who cares about Cormano?” She leaned closer to the table. “I know why she’s been at the hospital.”
—A Night At The Bar, Pony Planet Side Stories
I was gonna make some kind of 'word overuse' joke here, but you're right. it's really hard to be intentionally bad.
2739136
I wrote two side stories with deliberate misspellings, wrong word choice, and other grammatical travesties . . . it was so hard, and proofreading was worse. Having to make sure that I misspelled embassy as embasee every time hurt me.
2739142 I think, if I try to do that, I would go insane. My mind just doesn't work with making anything I do look intentionally bad. Take this comment, for example. I've automatically corrected about
fourfive mistakes I could very well leave alone. It's impossible for me.Stephen King has very strong opinions on this very subject.
On the subject of vernacular I am reading Dracula at the moment. There is one character who speaks in a very heavy vernacular and I have taken to skipping any paragraph where he is talking it's so confusing.
2739157
Interestingly, King is who I most likely learned to use dialogue tags from. I was reading a lot of King in the late 80s and early 90s. I don't think he's entirely right--timidly fits quite well with Fluttershy's dialogue, for example--but as with all tools, you need to use the right one for the job.
I learned that lesson myself in one story: a character spoke in a very pronounced Scottish brogue. It was such a pain to write, I started to just not give him any dialogue, unless it was unavoidable.
Once again, it can be used well, or badly. Some novels, like A Clockwork Orange are written in vernacular, and once you get immersed in it, it reads just as easily as everything else--but if you don't ever pick up the flow, the book's unreadable. I haven't read Dracula, but I'll admit I skipped all the elvish bits in Lord of the Rings.
Rainbow will be heartbroken when those fanfic pages fall right through her cloud desk. Then mortified when the breeze scatters them all over Ponyville.
2739200
That would actually make a pretty good plot hook for a story.
Hmm.
Are other peoples' writing styles getting you down? Do you sometimes wish you could throttle their throats with a garrotte made of double hyphens? Are you tired, fed up and not reading the rest of this because you're too busy gouging out your eyes after noticing the lack of a serial comma in that list?
Then have we got a solution!!! Introducing the one (and only) super-duper grammar fixer (not available in Canada [or Australia])!
"Its okay I guess, said William.
Why am I here again, thought Cassidy.
"They fuck is this "super duper whatever"," says John.
"I could see this being extremely useful if anyone wanted to correct their worst enemy'd grammar or even they're friend's because sometimes my friends don't seem to even try to use proper english let alone grammarSo what're you wai and its just super annoying at the best of times and this will definitely be useful in getting them to stop and think about what their saying for once instead of just rambling on as if nothing they've said is wrong and they're the best thing in the universe or something", said Arthur. Fuck you Arthur..
"OMG BESTEST THINGIE EVARRRRRRRR!!!!! <3<3<3," is Julia's words.
"I do not see the importance of this," breathed. Stuart Chillingworth. "It is a fad and nothing more," Stuart continued. Stuart then added, "It will be over soon."
"I am good at predicting these things, and it defiantly will not be around for a long period." Staurt concluded.
So what're you waiting for? Go get 'em, brah!
Fuck me with a ten-foot pipe wrench, that was hard to write.
2739317
I don't even
Let me respond with one of my pre-reader's favorite reaction gifs
s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/web05/2012/10/1/12/anigif_enhanced-buzz-15878-1349109770-4.gif
Lavender unicorn syndrome avoision protocols also run into the "repetition vs. narmy purpliness" problem; erring towards beige repetition is probably preferable for unskilled writers but I suspect that neither camp is really a source of "good" technique (after all, your finished example includes a little of everything you talk about here; struggling to find a "muttered"/"exclaimed"/"shouted"/"sighed" Tom Swifty to uniquely find-and-replace each "said" is almost exactly what you aren't doing, and that seems to be the archetypal Bad Writer Move that "saidism is ok" seeks to combat. [Parenthetical to the parenthetical: I'm pretty sure no one should ever use "sighed" as a dialogue tag. No, the unambiguous motion technique is not a sufficient defense, even if you replace the comma with a period.])
As a reader, I'd suggest writers be very careful with this. It's easy to get disoriented when sections like this get long, even when the characterization makes the speaker of any individual line clear; I would recommend breaking up such sections with the "unambiguous motion" technique (name included), so that readers have something to reorient with but you don't break up the taglessness of the dialogue. (As you say, though, this is all just a matter of opinion.)
The flip side of that is something you kind of implied but didn't say explicitly in the section about multiple untagged speakers: the chaos and confusion of not knowing who is saying what can actually be a pretty good technique for immersing the reader. In real life, you might hear a bunch of people talking all at once when the conversation is derailed and everyone is speaking over each other; the untagged dialogue can feel similar even if the individual lines aren't the dash-demarcated fragments you sometimes see. These moments (in life and fiction) are best when they're kept brief, though; when you experience such a thing in reality, you don't just sit there, you turn to someone and start a side conversation or shout your own contributions or (most dramatically) yell "SHUT UUUUUP!" and try to regain control of the conversation. I'd imagine a story doing this deliberately would need a similar re-focus.
2739224
I'd accuse you of being "the new Estee", but it turns out you've been on the site longer. So maybe Estee is the student, and you are the master? I ain't a historian.
Oh, and it's "plagiarized". And "complement."
2739337
What can I say? Besides 'I'm sorry', obviously.
'Cause I'm not.
new2.fjcdn.com/thumbnails/comments/It+seems+to+work+now+lol+i+have+no+idea+_4dc97e1072e1a41e1cfbc582cd910453.gif
)
(Sorry. Also, Road to El Dorado is one of my favorite movies, so props to your pre-readers!
I'm pretty much with you. I like variety in the way the narration delivers dialogue. And how I handle it is often on a per-case basis. Depending on how much and what kind of emotion is in the dialogue being presented.
As for vernacular... I use it a lot. I mean, it's hard not to when you have characters like AJ and RD and Gilda, they just talk like that. If you write their dialogue to be grammatically correct, their words will just look wrong to the readers who are already very much familiar with them. That said, I never use 'Ah' in place of 'I' for Applejack. I generally find it annoying, but that's just me. The rest of that there farmpony's way o' talkin' is up for grabs.
2739344
As an aside, "Lavender Foal Syndrome" is a real equine disease.
It does. I picked that particular passage for that reason; the chapter as a whole handles character voice and dialogue tags pretty well (at least that's what I've been told).
I don't think in writing there's any one right way to do it. I only wrote the blog because of the pre-reader comment on OPP 21, and that I was simultaneously editing a fic where the author preferred the 'said' tag above all others. It's not my cup of tea, but as they say, your results may vary.
I'm sure there's some case where 'sighed' is absolutely the right choice. In prose, every rule is made to be broken.
Yes, it's not always the right technique to use. If the reader gets lost, then the writer hasn't done his job. But there are some cases where it works. As with all tools, there's a time and place.
That was part of my rationale in this case--a bunch of ponies talking in a bar. Immerses the reader. But it's not always the right choice. I've read stories where I had to stop, go back, and count the lines to figure out who said what.
Well, I don't know about the whole student/master thing.
I look at some of the old heads on the site (Bad Horse, for one), and think about what a rookie I am.
Probably should have spell-checked. I thought those red squigglies under the words were racing stripes. Oh well.
2739354
I'm going to give you credit, personally, next time I write a chapter from the POV of the Ponyville Express.
2739360
That's really the best way. What works for one story won't work for another, and an author ought to know that. I play with POV more than most people do, so a story like Feels Like The First Time has a very different feel from A Foal's First Words, or Celestia Sleeps In.
Agreed. That could be the subject of its own blog post, because besides grammatical problems, word choice and usage is a very important part of character voice. RD might say "It's, like, awesome." Twilight never would.
Another one that's very much author's choice. I do use 'Ah,' but I don't ragequit when a fic with AJ doesn't.
2739344
I didn't mention mention that this technique works in film too (and I'm sure there are pony examples, since they come so close in other scenes), but I had forgotten that there's a definitive example of the trope (and probably a TVTropes page, but I don't know how to find it by that example)
2739363
Probably; I just identify it with amateurishly over-written try-hard sentimentality, like "orbs" or "limpid pools" for eyes.
And sorry for all the text-walling, but I came up with the phrase "lavender unicorn syndrome avoision protocols" and it's been kinda snowballing from there.
2739369 Hey. I honestly don't think I've ragequit a fic solely for that reason. But if I have, it was probably because the rest of the fic sucked.
When doing reviews, I try to only call the author out on saidism abuse when there's a massive overuse. In one recent review for a fairly short clop piece, the story had a total of 30 dialogue tags. Four were "asked". One was "said". The other 25 were saidisms, including such gems as... well, here's the list.
Whenever it gets severe enough that I start to notice tag usage just as much as what's being said, I go look for them and point it out.
Heh, I suppose this blog shouldn't come as a surprise. As you might imagine, I have some thoughts on the subject, but if you haven't done so already, I'd suggest first looking at the TV Tropes article on Said Bookism (aka saidism). It summarizes some related ground – in particular, it's worth noting that words like "asked" and "responded" are generally accepted as equivalent to the default "said" by all but the most uncompromising of readers.
(Now to actually write the rest of my response....)
Though they're obviously related, I think it's worth considering verbally-tagged dialogue and structurally-indicated dialogue separately, at least to start with. The pitfalls and cautions associated with each differ, and mismatching them leads only to madness and really painful writing.
The idea behind avoiding saidism is based in the invisible words concept [1*], from multiple directions. The obvious one is that unusual (or worse still, incorrectly-used) words can be distracting - in fact, that's the reason that examples you gave with "said" after a question read weirdly. The reader is constantly predicting what's coming up based on what they've already read, so something unexpected makes them have to restructure their mental model [2*].
[*1] Which really deserves a post or few of its own - it's a big and really important subject.
[*2] Odd tags are basically a less-extreme version of garden path sentences. While those can be a lot of fun, they're generally not a good idea in narrative unless you actually want to confuse the reader. And of course, the concept as a whole has a lot of far-reaching implications; as an xkcd fan, you may have seen the What If? post which touches on it, but that's just the tip of the iceberg.
If you do overuse them, the reader will begin to get used to it, which sounds good, at first. Unfortunately, at that point they lose all their impact and become functionally equivalent to "said", meaning that you have no way to emphasize your dialogue at all. And of course, they still look ridiculous.
Of course, saidisms aren't inherently bad - most won't cause any trouble if used correctly, and occasionally you want to shake the reader up a bit. However, abusing them is all too easy a slippery slope to fall down [3*], so it's easiest to just go with a blanket ban. As always, breaking the rule is at times the best choice, but you should only do so deliberately.
[3*] Citation: haven't you read any average-quality stories? Let alone the bad ones....
Hopefully that'll suffice for now. Unfortunately, it looks like I'll have to come back to this later (again), since I need to go do other stuff (again...).
You said too much. It might be a good idea to trim it down somewhat.
(I purposely edited this to not use "you" twice.)
Actually, it's not correct. Every British, U.S. and World English dictionary I consulted (in my ten minutes of intensive Googling
) agrees that the definition of the verb "say" is to "express (something) with words" or "to utter a pronouncement", i.e. to make a declarative statement.
An interrogative sentence, by definition, can never be "said" (even if it is vocalized).
The thing about saidisms is that far too many budding authors try to use far too many. They do their utmost to avoid repetition and thus end up abusing the thesaurus while their character extemporate, elucidate and waffle. You don't need to do all that. With an example like this:
You don't need to use 'asked'. We know he's asking because there's a question mark. You're literally repeating information, like with that hoof thing you wrote (well done, by the way, I have seen the like). I dislike 'muttered' and the sort as well, for similar reasons: it's all telling.
Mostly, when people see dialogue, their primary concern is "who is speaking". You can accomplish that with simple dialogue tags, with action tags, or by having strongly-voiced characters, e.g. Applejack. And that's why it's also a good idea not to spend too much time on your dialogue tags, because -- and I may just be speaking for myself here -- once the eye hits the character name, it's gonna shoot right on over to that next quote mark.
2739713 So, authors should avoid being too saidistic?
2739337 Other contenders include
mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/img/mlfw8325-fluttershy_kindness_mov.gif
And this one which is apparently too humongous to embed
2741322
Badum tish.
2739713
Asked is not-infrequently redundant, but so is "said". This is why omitting dialogue tags, or using character action to mark who is saying what, is often superior to using dialogue tags; dialogue tags really are supposed to be invisible, and if they stick out when they aren't supposed to, that's bad. They need to be adding important information, as otherwise they're drawing attention away from stuff which really does matter. The fact that we've got quotation marks around text means that we know who said something.
Personally, I find muttered to be fine so long as A) they don't overuse it and B) it clarifies the text. If someone mutters too much, then that isn't a good thing, but I don't mind it when it is used appropriately. Really, this is the case with all exposition; a lot of exposition is invisible, and thus it only really sticks out when it is particularly good or particularly bad.
2742397
Sometimes the simplest way to convey something is "muttered" or "whispered". I think I'm relaxing my aversion to those sorts of tags, though they definitely can be easily overused.
I think the way to look at 'said' is this: In the phrase "said Applejack", the important bit is not 'said', but 'Applejack'. We're not writing scripts, so you can't put "Applejack 'Ah lahk aypulz.'" You need to have something in there to fulfill the requirements of an English sentence, and 'said' is the least-obtrusive option. Think of it as a connector rather than an actual verb, unlike, say, 'asked' or 'mused'. And rather than seeking to omit 'said', as one might 'that' or 'like' (if we're into Vonnegut's rules and all), the writer should try to omit reasons to use said. In other words, varying sentence structure and using action tags. And then you don't have to worry about anything!
2743009
Eyup. I actually do this somewhat consciously when I have lots of dialogue, where I mix things up with various structures:
"Stuff" Tag
Tag "Stuff"
"Stuff" Tag "Stuff"
""
Of those, only the first and third might use "said" or a saidism, and you can often use body language or character action or something similar instead, so you don't have to use "said" a whole lot, either. I try to avoid too many of the same setup in a row. I've also been trying to search for overused words recently, but that's harder because it isn't always simple to identify them until someone else points them out to you.
The main time that tags end up being annoying is when you have a large number of characters in a single scene, because then the final option isn't really available in many cases, especially if the response is something which less obviously belongs to a single character (this is especially true of very short lines, which are often the ones you would most like to not tag because tagging those slows down the flow). Obviously some characters (Applejack, Luna) are more distinctive than others.
2739379
Like any type of performance art, if the audience is distracted by the mechanics, you're doing it wrong. Way back in my younger years, I pointedly avoided "said," at which point things got ugly, and I would have been that guy you reviewed. My next 'improvement' was only using action tags to fix speech, and that was even worse.
Finally, I realized that just like you wouldn't paint a house with only a 8" roller, you also shouldn't only use one technique for dialogue. The best method is whatever works right in that particular case.
2739424
If I was actually writing college essays, I probably would put some more thought into some of these blog posts. As it is, I just have a thought bouncing around in my head (in this case, dialogue tags, and you know why), and I write it down as it comes to me.
Thing is, like most writing techniques, there's a time and a place for every technique, and if writers only hear one perspective, they often jump to the opposite extreme. For example, knowing that you should use a different noun/pronoun to replace character names leads to L.U.S., and there are times when you should just tell, rather than show.
Of course I have. I've written plenty of average-quality stories, too.
2739470
TL:DR version:
Don't overuse 'said.'
Don't overuse 'saidisms.'
Don't confuse 'saidisms' with 'sadism.'
Don't overuse action tags to fix dialogue.
If you can't do the last three well, only use 'said.'
2739503
Did Spenser not express that with words?
I'm not disagreeing, mind you. There's a reason that I chose it as an example.
2739713
I did, before I figured it out. The problem with picking up writing advice from the internet is that there are a lot of opinionated people who will tell a writer to not do something, without saying why. "Never use saidisms" is not the same advice as "Only use saidisms when appropriate."
In the case I was quoting, Parker needed a dialogue tag so you'd know who said it, and apparently never came up with a better way to word it.
Also, I'd just like to say that I've read stuff where the author avoids "telling" to the point of making it almost unreadable. You can tell me, the reader, that it was noon. You don't have to describe the sun being overhead, or the clock chiming twelve times, or whatever other way an author can come up with to describe 'noon' without actually using that word.
Yes. All of my yes. I personally use all four techniques, where applicable. Also, open quotes are an author's friend, too, when it comes to monologues.
No, I think you're mostly right. That's why you've got to decide, on a case-by-case basis, if you're writing one the reader will just gloss over, or if you're imparting important information with the tag.
2742397
Yes. They're a necessary evil of the written word, but whenever an author can arrange the dialogue in such a way that they're not needed, that's probably the best choice. Unfortunately, in things like rapid-fire conversations, putting an action tag on each line would slow down the reader.
Another good point. I've also had times when the next character speaking names the first, thus:
In some cases, that doesn't matter. If you've got a bunch of characters talking, it doesn't always matter who's said which line, and there are times when I think it's okay for the author to not specify. For example, here's how I might write a particular scene in Monty Python:
2747464 Hmm... perhaps the ambiguity of the way that definition was phrased made it a poor choice for inclusion in my comment.
In the context of the other definitions and examples provided by the dictionary I lifted that wording from, it was a bit clearer that "(something)" was a placeholder meant to be replaced by a piece of information, not merely "anything at all".
2747528
Like I said, I don't think you're wrong in that it's a terrible choice of a dialogue tag. But I think the word "said" does technically qualify as legit in that particular case, especially if it was being read by an editor who had a vendetta against saidisms, or if Parker was famous enough by the time the novel was printed to say "I'd rather not change that." I think it really skirts the bounds of 'technically correct,' but you found a definition which does, indeed, say it is so.
2747541 Either I am misunderstanding your point or else you are misunderstanding mine. I'm honestly not sure which it is, so I will simply attempt to rephrase my own:
If I am correctly understanding the dictionary definition of "to say" (and I welcome any evidence that I am not- I'm perfectly willing to be proven wrong), you cannot "say" a question. You can "say" how you feel. You can "say" the sky is blue. You can "say" you would like to know what I had for breakfast. But, you cannot "say" what did you have for breakfast.
That last sentence is obviously grammatically incorrect because it is mixing two very different and incompatible types of speech. Note: I'm not offering that as "proof" of my point, but I hope it does, in some small way, help to make clearer what I was intending my earlier point to be in regards to the "(something)" placeholder.
2747584
Whee we're failing to meet, I think, is that you're making an absolute statement where in writing, there are no absolute statements.
To give a handy metaphor, you shouldn't paint a car with a roller and interior latex paint, because the end result will look like crap.
You're taking the absolute position--it's not possible to paint a car with a roller; if you do paint a car with a roller, you can't honestly say the car is painted.
My point is that you can paint a car with a roller.
It looks like crap.
But if the car in question is about to be entered in the demolition derby, and won't be seen from any closer than the grandstands, who cares?
So you can ask a question with a 'said' tag.
That's legit. (And yes, I'm blurring the line here, but in this case, 'said' was used twice, and works both times.) But writing fiction ain't math, there isn't an order of operations, and so long as you can keep the reader engaged, you're doing well. The main point of the quote, though, was that it was so unexpected that it takes the reader out of the moment, just as if you were engaged in a scene in a movie and then a stagehand walked across the frame. While 'said' might have been technically correct (or close enough), it's just as unexpected and disconcerting as that stagehand.
*EDIT: Trust me, the rules really get fuzzy when you're dealing with first-person narration.
2747643 On the contrary, there are plenty of absolute statements in writing. For instance, you can't write a grammatically correct complete sentence that does not include a verb. Absolutely.
(Yes, that was intentional. ;) )
I agree there are a fair number of "rules" that are actually not hard and fast rules, but merely guidelines with plenty of room for disagreement. The proper use of saidisms is a prime example. But at the same time, that doesn't mean there are no rules at all.
To take it back to your analogy, I am not arguing that you cannot paint a car with a roller. Of course you can paint a car with a roller and yes we will both agree that it looks like crap afterwards. What I am arguing is that you cannot paint a car with distilled water, because the definition of the verb "to paint" is (in the context we are discussing) defined as "the application of a substance containing pigment to a surface" and pure water does not satisfy that requirement.
2747665
If the car had been previously painted with tempera paint, you could. But that's solidly in the grey area.
We both know paint is often enough used metaphorically anyways--the victim's blood painted the floor isn't really what we mean by the dictionary definition of painting.
There's an old joke about the professor who says that while there are plenty of phrases with a double negative which make a positive, there are none with a double positive which make a negative. A student replies, "Yeah, right."
In my experience as both a reader and a writer, there's a time and a place to run roughshod over every rule of grammar, so long as the reader follows along.
2747716
*Sigh*
The use of "paint" in the metaphorical sense is entirely outside the context of the roller metaphor you used and I had hoped that including the parenthetical caveat emphasized above would allow us to keep this discussion on point rather than going down a rabbit hole that has no particular relevance for the topic we are actually discussing: whether or not "said" can be correctly applied to a question.
The (perhaps sad) thing about this whole debate is that, in effect, we are arguing for the same outcome. You are arguing that there is a time and a place to say "The hell with grammar, this "incorrect" form is a more effective way to convey meaning and I'm going to use it!"- to which I say, "Absolutely!" (Because saying "I believe you are absolutely correct!" is stilted and unnecessarily verbose, if grammatically correct, dialogue.)
On the other hand, I am arguing that, in this particular instance, not only is it necessary to use the word "asked" (anti-saidism be damned) for the sake of reader comprehension, but that it would actually be an outright violation of grammar to use "said" in this context. Neither one of use wants to write
because it looks damned ugly. I'm merely arguing that it looks ugly precisely because it's incorrect grammar. In this instance, I contend running "roughshod over every rule of grammar" is precisely what Robert B. Parker did in order to achieve such a horrendously jarring sentence and his editor should be ashamed for not insisting on changing it.
Grammar rules do not form in a vacuum. They are, for the most part, reflections of how people expect the language to be used. That is precisely why they are often so useful in promoting reader comprehension. I very much doubt there are any reputable professional grammarians who would actually expect someone to use the word "said" as a dialogue tag for an interrogative and I would be very surprised indeed to learn that there is any true "technical" allowance for it in the language. But, as I said at the outset of this discussion, I'm perfectly willing to be proven wrong on that point via evidence.
In either event, it's rather late and I don't see much value in continuing to argue with each other over which type of paint should never be applied to an automobile via roller, so I'm perfectly willing to allow you the last word on the subject.