Dialogue

Dialogue

Dialogue • Dialogue is the presentation of what characters in a literary work say. • It is a crucial element of drama, and also of fiction and narrative poetry. • Uses: – To reveal characters’ motives, feelings, values, and relationships – To advance the plot – To suggest tone

Dialogue • Dialogue is a primary means of depicting character • Other characters’ responses can suggest their relationship, including the level of power relative to each other • Great Gatsby example: – In the following example, Nick Carraway has just been taken by Tom Buchanan, his cousin’s husband, to meet his “girl.” Tom’s mistress is married to the owner of a dilapidated garage, George Wilson, who has no inkling of the adultery. This is Nick’s and the reader’s introduction to Wilson:

Great Gatsby Example …the proprietor…appeared in the door of an office, wiping his hands on a piece of waste. He was a blond, spiritless man, anemic, and faintly handsome. When he saw us a damp gleam of hope sprang into his light blue eyes. “Hello, Wilson, old man,” said Tom, slapping him jovially on the shoulder. “How’s business?” “I can’t complain,” answered Wilson unconvincingly. “When are you going to sell me that car?” “Next week; I’ve got my man working on it now.” “Works pretty slow, don’t he?” “No, he doesn’t,” said Tom coldly. “And if you feel that way about it, maybe I’d better sell it somewhere else after all.” “I don’t mean that,” explained Wilson quickly. “I just meant—” His voice faded off and Tom glanced impatiently around the garage.

Explanation • Everything about the scene implies Wilson’s weakness and subjugation to Tom’s will: – His faded physical appearance – His tentative gestures – His pathetic hope that Tom will bring a bit of lucrative business to the failing shop

• Nick first describes him as “spiritless” and “anemic,” and, fittingly, he is “wiping his hands on a bit of waste.” • Tom immediately takes control, speaking the first words, and “slapping” Wilson with false joviality. • The one time that Wilson attempts to assert himself, Tom cuts him off “coldly,” and Wilson retracts his complaint and fades into silence. • The first-person witness leaves no doubt of the cuckolded husband’s powerlessness or of his betrayer’s contempt.

More Uses of Dialogue • Another technique for using dialogue is to depict character is to recount differences between a character’s reported thoughts and his or her spoken words

Example • In Jane Austen’s Emma, the protagonist is often constrained by the manners required in her upper-class society from expressing her actual opinions or preferences. • She is adept, however, at avoiding uncomfortable topics by maintaining a polite silence or by changing the subject. • The omniscient narrator reveals the contrast between Emma’s thoughts and words in such comments as the following:

Emma This is her reaction to an awkward dispute she is having with a close family friend and mentor: “It was most convenient to Emma not to make a direct reply to this assertion; she chose rather to take up her own line of the subject again.”

Another Example • In “The Red Convertible” by Louise Erdich, the teenage narrator/protagonist, Lyman Lamartine, speaks words that are markedly at odds with his thoughts. • Lyman is a Chippewa Indian who is struggling with how to deal with his older brother Henry’s emotional illness. • Henry, a former marine and captive in a prisoner of war camp in Vietnam, is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

“The Red Convertible” • The crisis is complicated by the brothers’ isolation and poverty. • They live on a remote reservation, which contains no Indian therapists, and no one in the family trusts mainstream hospitals. • Even if they could afford such treatment, the mother charges that “’[the doctors] just give them drugs,’” and in any case both the mother and Lyman know that henry would refuse to be committed.

“The Red Convertible” • At this point in the story, Henry is virtually mute with depression, and Lyman is desperate to help him. • Suddenly, he thinks of the red convertible that the two of them had bought and fixed up before Henry was drafted:

“The Red Convertible” One night Henry was off somewhere. I took myself a hammer. I went out to that car and I did a number on its underside. Whacked it up. Bent the tail pipe double. Ripped the muffler loose. By the time I was done with the car it looked worse than any typical Indian car that has been driven all its life on the reservation roads, which they always say are like government promises—full of holes. It just about hurt me, I’ll tell you that! I threw dirt in the carburetor and I ripped all the electric tape off the seats. I made it look just as beat up as I could. Then I sat back and waited.

“The Red Convertible” Still, it took him over a month. That was all right, because it was just getting warm enough, not melting, but warm enough to work outside. “Lyman,” he says, walking in one day,” that red car looks like shit.” “Well, it’s old,” I say. “You got to expect that.” “No way!” says Henry. “That car’s a classic! But you went and ran the piss right out of it, Lyman, and you know it don’t deserve that. I kept that car in A-one shape. You don’t remember. You’re too young. But when I left, that car was running like a watch. Now I don’t even know if I can get it to start again, let alone get it anywhere near its old condition.” “Well you try,” I said, like I was getting mad, “but I say it’s a piece of junk.” Then I walked out before he could realize I knew he’d strung together more than six words at once.

Explanation • Lyman’s actions make clear the strength of his love for his brother. • He is willing to sacrifice the car, despite how much he treasures it, in the hope of helping Henry. • After pounding and ripping the convertible on which he has lavished so much care, he admits of the wrecking, – “It just about hurt me, I’ll tell you that!”

Explanation • Lyman’s easy colloquialism and his candor make his voice fresh and appealing. • He is confiding in the reader what he must be careful to keep secret from everyone else. • The plan is also a tribute to Lyman’s cleverness. • He creates a way to draw Henry out of his depression, inspire his self-esteem, and give him a meaningful project.

Explanation • He also knows enough to lie low and let Henry discover the car on his own. • Then he denies that the convertible has been damaged, replying off-handedly to Henry’s accusation, “Well, it’s old.” • That dismissal triggers a heated protest from Henry that the car is “a classic” that he had “kept running in A-one shape.” • With typical older brother condescension, Henry claims that Lyman is “too young” to remember the car’s former glory.

Prose Fiction • In prose fiction the proportion of dialogue to narration varies enormously. • Some short stories are comprised almost entirely of dialogue: • Ernest Hemingway’s, “Hills Like White Elephants”

• Some novels also have moments of increased dialogue: • Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre • During the heroine’s reunion with her beloved Mr. Rochester, he is jealous of the relationship that she has had with another man, her cousin St. John Rivers, during her absence. • Mr. Rochester, who has been blinded and maimed, has been severely depressed, and Jane is delighted at this chance to revive his fighting spirit and direct his energies at someone who, as she knows, is no rival to him:

Jane Eyre “How long did you reside with him and his sisters after the cousinship was discovered?” “Five months.” “Did Rivers spend much time with the ladies of his family?” “Yes; the back parlour was both his study and ours: he sat near the window, and we by the table. “Did he study much?” “A good deal.” “What?” “Hindostanee.” “And what did you do meantime?” “I studied German at first.” “Did he teach you?” “He did not understand German.”

Jane Eyre “Did he teach you nothing?” “A little Hindostanee.” “Rivers taught you Hindostanee?” “Yes, sir.” “And his sisters also?” “No.” “Only you?” “Only me.” “Did you ask to learn?” “No.” “He wished to teach you?” “Yes.”

Explanation • Mr. Rochester’s jealousy is implied by the precise crossexamination to which he subjects Jane. • Knowing that her intelligence and love of learning, he focuses on the role that she has played of star pupil, seeing it, rightly, for the show of favor that it is. • His jealousy is further suggested through his concentration on the nature of their study, an esoteric subject that suggests both River’s erudition and his respect for Jane’s abilities.

Explanation • It is also suggested by his pointed inquiry into whether or not Rivers singled her out from his sisters. • Jane’s curt answers of course pique Rochester’s curiosity and tease him with the implication that she has something to hide. • For the reader, the dramatic irony achieved by knowing Jane’s actual feelings and motives—she is the narrator as well as the protagonist of the novel and has confided her intentions beforehand—makes the scene a comic interlude.

Hmmm. • Such passages of straight dialogue may give readers the impression that they are eavesdropping on a real-life conversation, which the author has just happened to record. • In actuality, the shaping hand of the writer is very much at work in such scenes, choosing words and phrases that are characteristic of each speaker; eliminating the pauses, stammerings, and irrelevancies that litter everyday talk; and pacing the exchange for both efficiency and verisimilitude.

Mas (lo siento!) • In addition, any contrasts between what a character says in various contexts can be both convincing and revealing. • This is especially crucial in drama, since the characterization must come almost entirely through the dialogue.

Romeo and Juliet • In Romeo and Juliet, Lord Capulet makes a series of strikingly different pronouncements about his daughter Juliet’s freedom to choose a husband. • He first tells her new suitor, the County Paris, that he must “woo her” and “get her heart,” for his own permission depends on her “consent.”

Romeo and Juliet • When, a short while later, Juliet has become deeply depressed, supposedly over her cousin Tybalt’s death, Capulet decides that marriage would be the ideal cure for her melancholy. • He tells the count that he can vouch for his daughter’s agreement to an immediate wedding: – “I think she will be ruled/In all respects by me; nay more, I doubt it not.”

Romeo and Juliet • Juliet, however, is grieving over her forced separation from Romeo, the son of her family’s mortal enemy, whom she has secretly married. • Without revealing the reason, she refuses the match with Paris. • Capulet, outraged, tells her: – “An you be mine, I’ll give you to my friend;/An you be not, hang, beg, starve, die in the streets.”

Romeo and Juliet • Capulet’s initial permissiveness, it is suggested, depended on his complacent conviction that his daughter’s will coincides with his own. • His authority is threatened, Capulet goes from being an indulgent parent to the ruthless tyrant. • The inconsistencies in his attitude make him a more plausible, albeit not a more sympathetic, character.

Still More! • In a novel, a novella, and a short story, the author may also shape the impact of dialogue by using speech headings: – Descriptions of characters’ vocal tones or gestures as they speak a line: • “slapping him jovially on the shoulder” • “explain Wilson quickly”

• In plays there may be stage directions • Some plays use stage directions sparingly (Shakespeare), while others use quite elaborate directions:

Stage Directions • From Tennessee William’s The Glass Menagerie (this is in the aftermath of a quarrel between the adult son and his mother) The music of “Ave Maria” is heard softly. Tom glances sheepishly but sullenly at her averted figure and slumps at the table. The coffee is scalding hot; he sips it and gasps and spits it back in the cup. At his gasp, Amanda catches her breath and half turns. Then she catches herself and turns back to the window. Tom blows on his coffee, blancing sidewise at his mother. She clears her throat. Tom clears his. He starts to rise, sinks back down again, scratches his head, clears his throat again, Amanda coughs. Tom raises his cup in both hands to blow on it, his eyes staring over the rim of it at his mother for several moments. Then he slowly sets the cup down and awkwardly and hesitantly rises from the chair.

Explanation • From the background music to the gasps and throat clearings to the awkward glances, it is clear that both parties to the quarrel care about one another and are preparing to make up.

Style • The style of dialogue also varies considerably from work to work. • Some authors of fiction, such as Henry James and George Eliot, give characters long, elaborate speeches. • Others, such as Hemingway and Salinger, are notable for the economy and naturalness with which characters speak. • Drama also shows an enormous range in degrees of formality

Style • Some authors use a combination of direct and indirect discourse, in which a third-person narrator summarizes the words of a character but replicates his or her characteristic idioms and patterns of thought. • In James Joyce’s “Eveline,” the protagonist is contemplating the freedom that she hopes to have, after she elopes to Buenos Aires, from the oppression that she suffers at work and at home:

“Eveline” She would not cry many tears at leaving the Stores. But in her new home, in a distant unknown country, it would not be like that. Then she would be married—she, Eveline. People would treat her with respect then. She would not be treated as her mother had been.

Explanation • Both the young woman’s wonder at the new status that marriage will convey and her resentment of the ill treatment that she has undergone are reflected in the colloquial word choice— “would not cry many tears” –and simple sentences– “People would treat her with respect then.”

Explanation • The use of her own name– “she, Eveline” – stresses her need to confirm that it is really she who will attain the incredible rise in status. • The indirect discourse, the fact that the narrator is reporting Eveline’s words, however, suggests what the story goes on to show, that Eveline does not have the confidence or the selfknowledge to carry through with her one chance to escape.

Another Example • Jane Austen uses third-person narration of a character’s dialogue very differently in the scene from Emma in which the social-climbing Mr. Elton proposes to the heroine. • Emma, who has been angling to match him with her friend Harriet, is shocked. • The episode is narrated from Emma’s perspective:

Emma To restrain him as much as might be, by her own manners, she was immediately preparing to speak with exquisite calmness and gravity of the weather and the night; but scarcely had she begun, scarcely had they passed the sweep-gate and joined the other carriage, than she found her subject cut up—her hand seized—her attention demanded, and Mr. Elton actually making violent love to her: availing himself of the precious opportunity, declaring sentiments which must be already well known, hoping—fearing—adoring—ready to die if she refused him; but flattering himself that his ardent attachment and unequalled love and unexampled passion could not fail of having some effect, and in short, very much resolved on being seriously accepted as soon as possible. It really was so.

Explanation • The omniscient narrator makes clear Emma’s aversion to his first hints by describing her plans to ignore them. • That ploy swiftly fails, the fervor of Mr. Elton’s advances reflected in the verbs: “seized,” “demanded,” and “making violent love” –in the last case, it should be noted for modern readers, only in words, not in actions.

Explanation • Then follows the summary of his proposal. • Had the narrator allowed the young man to speak for himself, there is a chance that he might have gained some undeserved sympathy from readers. • As the offer is presented, however, in a series of participles and with all of the “sentiments” focused on his own feelings and desires, rather than on Emma’s, the superficial and selfserving nature of his “ardent attachment” is made abundantly clear.

Indirect Discourse • Indirect discourse can be an effective means to signal either pathos—pity for weakness and suffering, as with Eveline—or ironic detachment, as with Mr. Elton. • In either case, the narrator is implying the tone by speaking for the characters rather than allowing their voices to be heard.

Repartee • A technique for creating lively dialogue, common to both drama and prose fiction, is repartee: • A rapid-fire exchange of witty remarks in which each speaker tries to score against an opponent in a verbal fencing match. • Taming of the Shrew example:

Taming of the Shrew PETRUCHIO: Nay, come, Kate, come, you must not look so sour. KATE: It is my fashion when I see a crab. PETRUCHIO: Why, here’s no crab, and therefore look not sour. KATE: There is, there is. PETRUCHIO: Then show it me. KATE: Had I a glass I would.

Explanation • It is clear from the brevity of the parries and the candor of Kate’s witticisms both that Petruchio will have no easy task and that the couple is well matched.

Soliloquy • A soliloquy (from the Latin word for “to speak alone”) is a monologue delivered by a character who is alone on stage. • He or she may address the audience as though they are confidantes or simply seem to be thinking aloud, expressing thoughts that are too private or too risky to share with other characters.

Soliloquy • Soliloquies represent a break in the ongoing action and are reserved for major characters, usually the protagonist, and for important revelations. • Often, Shakespeare’s villains will confide in the audience in order to parade their cleverness and ruthlessness.

Iago • Iago has bribed a man named Rodrigo, who is in love with Othello’s wife, Desdemona, to help break them up. He tells Rodrigo that he will “Put money in thy purse,” and then he delivers the following soliloquy to the audience:

Iago Thus do I ever make my fool my purse; For mine own gained knowledge should profane If I would time expend with such a snipe (fool) But for my sport and profit. I hate the Moor, And it is thought abroad (rumored) that ‘twixt my sheets H’as done my office (business in bed). I know not if’t be true, But I, for mere suspicion in that kind, Will do for surety. He holds me well; (in high esteem) The better shall my purpose work on him. Cassio’s a proper man (handsome). Let me see now: To get his place, and to plume up my will (gratify my desire) In double knavery—how, how? –Let’s see: After some time, to abuse Othello’s ears That he (Cassio) is too familiar with his wife He hath a person and a smooth dispose (manner) To be suspected—framed to make women false. The Moor is of a free and open nature That thinks men honest that but see to be so; And will as tenderly be led by th’ nose As asses are. I have’t! It is engendered! Hell and night Must bring this monstrous birth to the world’s light.

Explanation • Several aspects of Iago’s nature are revealed in the soliloquy: – – – –

His deviousness His lack of scruples His twisted values His wily intelligence

• He scorns the hapless Roderigo, whom he sees as a “fool” and a “snipe,” valuable only for the “profit” of amusement (“sport”) that he provides.

Explanation • He feels hate toward Othello, and his extremely jealous of him simply because of the “suspicion” that Othello has had an adulterous affair with his wife Emilia—a charge that even he admits is based on implausible gossip. • It is not only human faults that evoke Iago’s contempt, however; he is even more scornful of virtues: – Cassio’s handsomeness and courtly manner – Othello’s “free and open nature”

• He allies himself with the forces of evil—”Hell” and the “night”

Effects of Soliloquy • The effects of a soliloquy on the audience are similar to those of first-person narration in a short story or a novel. • The audience must gauge the reliability of the speaker. • If the speaker is a villain, the audience may feel both flattered and revolted. • When the motives are benevolent, the effect is to create bonds of sympathy between speaker and audience.

Aside • An aside is a speech, usually brief, that is heard only by the audience, or sometimes, is addressed privately to another character on stage. • It can represent thoughts said aloud. • In Hamlet, King Claudius plots to kill his stepson/nephew by poisoning his wine at a fencing match. When the queen drinks that wine instead, he knows that expressing anguish aloud would risk revealing his treasonous scheme, so he confines his reaction to a horrified aside: – “It is the poisoned cup; it is too late.”

Ta Da!