Hello, writers. I was going to write about breaking the fourth wall, but the trouble is that’s one of those things of more interest to readers than writers.
You know what breaking the fourth wall is, right? It’s when the reader is addressed directly and reminded that this is only a story. It’s a bit of writerly stunt-riding, because of course we go to a great deal of effort to keep the reader from thinking that this is only a story.
A common variation of it is when the characters remind each other that this isn’t a story, this is real. (Think of Sam’s rant to Frodo that their adventures would make a great story. “Even Gollum might be good in a tale, better than he is to have by you, anyway...I wonder if he thinks he's the hero or the villain?”)
(We know the answer to that question, right?)
Nineteenth century novelists could get away with pages-long rants addressed to the reader. Jane Austen could make coy remarks about the reader guessing the ending from the number of pages left in his right hand. Dickens could rail against the System, and Harriet Beecher Stowe could exhort her readers to come to Jesus.
You can’t get away with that stuff nowadays. From the 20th century on fourth-wall stuff largely occurs in dialogue, and the trick is to make it occur so naturally and so much in the character’s real voice that it’s hardly noticeable. I end up deleting most of the fourth-wall lines I write. Fourth wall stuff only stays in if it’s what the characters really would say, and if it gives the readers something to enjoy noticing.
Okay, I guess I ended up talking about the fourth wall after all.
Which brings us, as Mr. Colbert would say, to tonight’s challenge.
Tonight’s challenge is a bit of dialogue writing. Have your characters be aware that they’re in a story… or aware that they’re not in a story, that this is real.
Please consider the following rules for dialogue, even if you hate rules:
-people don’t usually speak in complete, grammatical sentences
-people interrupt each other
-people don’t always say what they really mean
-conflict is golden
-each character’s voice should be distinctive enough that you can’t reassign a line of dialogue without rewriting it.
Tonight’s challenge:
I’ve done all the heavy lifting here. All you’ve got to do is fill in the stuff between the quotation marks.
“_?” Gustav asked.
Esmeralda stared at him. “--”
“,” said Gustav.
“?”
“.”
“.” Gustav moved to block the door.
“--”
“?”
“.” Esmeralda drew a gun.
“_.”
(NB—if the fourth-wall thing doesn’t work and something else works better, by all means drop the fouth-wall thing.)
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