Is it Appropriate to Include More Than One Prose-Dialogue Pair in Each Block?

[Eclair_de_XII]

***Title should read: ``Is it appropriate to include more than one instance of a prose-dialogue pair in each prose-dialogue block?''

instance of `prose-dialogue pair'? I don't know what they're called, actually, so I'll give an example of what I mean.

"Hello Bob," said Sally. "How is the weather today?"

When I say `prose-dialogue pairs', I refer to the pattern of dialogue, ` "Hello Bob," ', followed by the bit of prose `said Sally'. In general, I refer to patterns that are usually of the form:

"[:sentence:]+[!?,]" [:speaking-verb:] [:character name:]

I know I'm over-complicating things by expressing my meaning in the form of an informal (and probably incorrect) regular expression. Forgive me if I am unable to express myself clearly, but I've not taken a creative-writing class before, and the last composition class I took was in high school over a decade ago. Anyway, I'm asking if a sentence like this would make a literature fan raise his or her eyebrows:

"I don't think it's silly at all to just run off, Sally," said Bob. "In fact, let's just never get off this wagon. Let's go wherever this thing takes us," he said, gesturing uselessly to their invisible, non-sentient driver. "As long as we're together," he continued, resting his hand on hers, "it won't make a difference to me."

There are three prose-dialogue pairs here. Should I restructure this so that there is only one pair per prose-dialogue block?

 

[Melbourne Guy]

That's entirely appropriate, and common, @Eclair_de_XII. Even the second last para (starting, "I don't think it's silly...") works because the sentences are part of the same event. You could split that into a new para at the, "As long as..." if you wanted to, but it's not necessary.

As for rules around this, I'm a grammar-lite type of guy, relying on my editing tools to tell me if there are critical problems with my writing, so I can't point you to a definitive style guide. To be fair, the tools don't tend to flag what you're asking about, but if you read it back out loud, it can help with where the para breaks need to be.

 

[Drakkith]

"I don't think it's silly at all to just run off, Sally," said Bob. "In fact, let's just never get off this wagon. Let's go wherever this thing takes us," he said, gesturing uselessly to their invisible, non-sentient driver. "As long as we're together," he continued, resting his hand on hers, "it won't make a difference to me."

You can do this, but breaking up a character's speech more than once or twice in a paragraph should be used relatively sparingly, as it breaks the flow.

 

[Choppy]

One of the reasons it's not commonly seen is because often the dialogue tag is there simply to help the reader recognize who is speaking. Once the speaker is identified, you don't need another tag.

You might break up a paragraph of dialogue with action if there are multiple things going on. But as Drakkith said above, if you do this too much it can make the text difficult to follow. So generally if there's a new action, it comes with a new paragraph.

 

[BWV]

Just ask yourself WWCD (and if you haven't read Cormac McCarthy, you can't really call yourself a writer IMO)

line breaks, no quotation marks

The judge placed his hands on the ground. He looked at his inquisitor. This is my claim, he said. And yet everywhere upon it are pockets of autonomous life. Autonomous. In order for it to be mine nothing must be permitted to occur upon it save by my dispensation.

Toadvine sat with his boots crossed before the fire. No man can acquaint himself with everything on this earth, he said.

The judge tilted his great head. The man who believes that the secrets of this world are forever hidden lives in mystery and fear. Superstition will drag him down. The rain will erode the deeds of his life. But that man who sets himself the task of singling out the thread of order from the tapestry will by the decision alone have taken charge of the world and it is only by such taking charge that he will effect a way to dictate the terms of his own fate.

somewhat more seriously, in your example, if two people are talking and one is addressing the other by name, you don't need to add 'Bob said', it is obvious

"Hello Bob, How is the weather today?"

"Fine, blah blah"

 

[Melbourne Guy]

line breaks, no quotation marks

Is that an example of McCarthy's writing, @BWV? I'd imagine it would be easy to mentally drift and miss who's saying what without quotation marks! I'll be honest, I think I would find it hard to parse and wouldn't enjoy the experience.

if two people are talking and one is addressing the other by name, you don't need to add 'Bob said', it is obvious

Yes, that's a really good point. I've stripped more character names from dialogue than anything else in my proofreading. It's only when you've a multi-person conversation that you need to keep including names...or occasionally in a long dialogue sequence to anchor the reader whose prone to mentally drifting

 

[BWV]

Is that an example of McCarthy's writing, @BWV? I'd imagine it would be easy to mentally drift and miss who's saying what without quotation marks! I'll be honest, I think I would find it hard to parse and wouldn't enjoy the experience.

Yes, from Blood Meridian
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/nov/14/david-vann-cormac-mccarthyTry reading one of his books, it works very well - he is on anyone's shortlist for American fiction writer of his generation

 

[Melbourne Guy]

Try reading one of his books, it works very well

I'll add him to the list, @BWV, thanks for the tip, though I'm writing more than reading at the moment, so it might be a year before I surface from that!

 

[sysprog]

Comporary writers tend to break up paragraphs more than writers did in earlier days. Maybe look at how it's done in the classics, e.g. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer:

CHAPTER I​

"TOM!”

No answer.

“TOM!”

No answer.

“What’s gone with that boy, I wonder? You TOM!”

No answer.

The old lady pulled her spectacles down and looked over them about the room; then she put them up and looked out under them. She seldom or never looked through them for so small a thing as a boy; they were her state pair, the pride of her heart, and were built for “style,” not service—she could have seen through a pair of stove-lids just as well. She looked perplexed for a moment, and then said, not fiercely, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear:

“Well, I lay if I get hold of you I’ll—”

She did not finish, for by this time she was bending down and punching under the bed with the broom, and so she needed breath to punctuate the punches with. She resurrected nothing but the cat.

“I never did see the beat of that boy!”

She went to the open door and stood in it and looked out among the tomato vines and “jimpson” weeds that constituted the garden. No Tom. So she lifted up her voice at an angle calculated for distance and shouted:

“Y-o-u-u TOM!”

There was a slight noise behind her and she turned just in time to seize a small boy by the slack of his roundabout and arrest his flight.

“There! I might ’a’ thought of that closet. What you been doing in there?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What is that truck?”

“I don’t know, aunt.”

“Well, I know. It’s jam—that’s what it is. Forty times I’ve said if you didn’t let that jam alone I’d skin you. Hand me that switch.”

The switch hovered in the air—the peril was desperate—

“My! Look behind you, aunt!”

The old lady whirled round, and snatched her skirts out of danger. The lad fled on the instant, scrambled up the high board-fence, and disappeared over it.

His aunt Polly stood surprised a moment, and then broke into a gentle laugh.

“Hang the boy, can’t I never learn anything? Ain’t he played me tricks enough like that for me to be looking out for him by this time? But old fools is the biggest fools there is. Can’t learn an old dog new tricks, as the saying is. But my goodness, he never plays them alike, two days, and how is a body to know what’s coming? He ’pears to know just how long he can torment me before I get my dander up, and he knows if he can make out to put me off for a minute or make me laugh, it’s all down again and I can’t hit him a lick. I ain’t doing my duty by that boy, and that’s the Lord’s truth, goodness knows. Spare the rod and spile the child, as the Good Book says. I’m a laying up sin and suffering for us both, I know. He’s full of the Old Scratch, but laws-a-me! he’s my own dead sister’s boy, poor thing, and I ain’t got the heart to lash him, somehow. Every time I let him off, my conscience does hurt me so, and every time I hit him my old heart most breaks. Well-a-well, man that is born of woman is of few days and full of trouble, as the Scripture says, and I reckon it’s so. He’ll play hookey this evening, * and [* Southwestern for “afternoon”] I’ll just be obleeged to make him work, tomorrow, to punish him. It’s mighty hard to make him work Saturdays, when all the boys is having holiday, but he hates work more than he hates anything else, and I’ve got to do some of my duty by him, or I’ll be the ruination of the child.”

Tom did play hookey, and he had a very good time. He got back home barely in season to help Jim, the small colored boy, saw next-day’s wood and split the kindlings before supper—at least he was there in time to tell his adventures to Jim while Jim did three-fourths of the work. Tom’s younger brother (or rather half-brother) Sid was already through with his part of the work (picking up chips), for he was a quiet boy, and had no adventurous, trouble-some ways.

 

[Melbourne Guy]

I don't know, @sysprog, Iain M. Banks has some long paragraphs, as does Peter F. Hamilton, and even Neal Asher, so maybe it's more author discretion than period based? Or perhaps it's the degree of exposition over dialogue? Jerome K. Jerome's classic, Three Men in a Boat, it's more 'modern' but it is dialogue heavy (it's also out of copyright, so a fun free read). Compare that to Jules Verne, who loved to write pages of technical description, his books are heavy going.

 

[Eclair_de_XII]

breaking up a character's speech more than once or twice in a paragraph should be used relatively sparingly, as it breaks the flow

You might break up a paragraph of dialogue with action if there are multiple things going on. But as Drakkith said above, if you do this too much it can make the text difficult to follow. So generally if there's a new action, it comes with a new paragraph.

Good to note. I shall keep these in mind when I go through the arduous task of rereading my composition, and doing some editing and rewriting. At the risk of deviating from the literature discussion taking place at the mo', I mean to ask about prose elements that should be used sparingly:

Is it silly to have an obsession about including too many semicolons and em-dashes in prose, to the point that the writer is using grep in order to track the number of lines in which such prose elements are used? Is it silly, moreover, for the writer to try to retroactively minimize the usage of such elements by editing them out after the composition is finished?

 

[Choppy]

Is it silly to have an obsession about including too many semicolons and em-dashes in prose, to the point that the writer is using grep in order to track the number of lines in which such prose elements are used? Is it silly, moreover, for the writer to try to retroactively minimize the usage of such elements by editing them out after the composition is finished?

Not at all.

All writers have their overused words, phrases other "characteristic" traits.

Often you don't recognize these on your own either. They're something that a keen editor will pick up on though. But once you are aware of them, it's good practice to search them out and smooth them over as you edit.