An often used bon-mot of writers and teachers of writing is “tell don’t show” “Show don’t tell”. This means that a text becomes boring if it tells us what to think about what is going on, instead of showing us this through action. Simply stating “he loved her very much” is boring tell, and furthermore strangely unconvincing because it is a cliché. But showing us how he gives her flowers, or runs in front of a moving train for her, is showing us how much he loves her.
However, things are not so simple. The dictum of “tell don’t show” “show don’t tell” often paralyses a writer, who thinks that he must always come up with imaginative and new ways of showing everything. But please remark how the very telling sentence “he loved her very much” can become very showing by a slight change of perspective to “he used to say that he loved her very much”. The flat telling, clichéd sentence suddenly becomes filled with irony and doubt, and although we know too little about him and her to really know anything, it shows us a much more interesting situation. Did he use to say it because he didn’t mean it? Or because he meant it too much?
Likewise, there are some pitfalls in telling by showing that I personally regard as clichés; for instance, when some writers attempt to create a psychotic killer persona with no inhibitions whatsoever, they might end up making that person killing a pet – particularly a dog – because they can’t come up with any means to mold their killer properly.
To me, that – if being used as the only indication of the person’s state of mind – is using an easy (cliché) way out, since the reader reaction almost every time will turn into contempt, even though the author used a writing trick that’s more cheating than skill.
Bret Easton Ellis fortunately managed to create an extremely elaborate psychological profile of the protagonist Patrick Bateman, so his killing a dog cannot be regarded as a desperate author trying to figure out how to convey his idea of a basket case killer.
Try to compare this to the protagonist of the new tv-series, Dexter, which – both the fictional person himself and the creators – doesn’t/don’t hesitate to show the lent inspiration from American Psycho; where Easton Ellis created a deep persona, the Dexter writers fail in doing so; therefore, the killing of a dog, lacking any other psychological profiling elements in the show, makes it look like a very week attempt to create a whole, credible person(a). Dexter’s childhood past is, from what I’ve seen so far, so the origin of his mentally stuntedness might be revealed, but even so it will only be the diagnostic portrayal of his partial insanity and not the symptomatic, showing the viewers only – potentially, pending on if they plan to lift the veil of his shadowy past – the ‘why’ he is the way he is, but not how.
It’s obvious that there’s always a bad and good way to do something, even when telling by showing, but the Dexter contra American Psycho, which has already been delved into a-plenty, was a case to good to pass up.
A correction to my post; here’s how it should read:
<i>”Dexter’s childhood past is, from what I’ve seen so far, the origin of his mentally stuntedness might be revealed, but even so it will only be the diagnostic portrayal of his partial insanity and not the symptomatic, showing the viewers only – potentially, pending on if they plan to lift the veil of his shadowy past – the ‘why’ he is the way he is, but not ‘how’.
It’s obvious that there’s always a bad and good way to do something, even when telling by showing, but the Dexter contra American Psycho, which has already been delved into a-plenty, was a case too good to pass up.”</i>
I have a bad habit of getting ahead of myself when writing on your blog. Call it eagerness if you will.
Hello Niclas,
Thank you for the astute perspectivation. I haven’t seen Dexter. Is it showing on Danish channels?
I can’t really tell, why you turn the dictum upside down. The mantra goes “show, don’t tell”, and your post appears to take off from there – yet twice you write “tell don’t show”. Perhaps (or probably) it’s an error but I have to ask. I couldn’t bear it if I was missing out on some brilliant point. So – why do you do it backwards apparently without any reason?
Lol, you’re right. My bad, no brilliance there, I just wrote the post in a hurry. It is of course “Show, don’t tell.”
Thank you. Now I can rest my brain.
At first I didn’t think Dexter showed on Danish tv, but a Google searched revealed that Canal+ Plus has picked it up and shown it since 11th of January.
The first season’s over, so you might have the chance to get it at your local Blockbuster, or just buy the season box instead.