Realistic Dialog?

[JamesSD]

So I know there are plenty of realism vs. fantasy threads, but I'm going to take a slightly different angle here.

Is it better to have your characters talk like real people (i.e. grammatically incorrect, sometimes unclear meanings, slang)

OR

Is it better to clean it up and have somewhat idealized dialog?

I tend to lean more towards the former. I use a lot of "gonna"s, "geez"s, "Well," "Hmmm", etc. At the same time I do try to punctuate properly and limit the sentence fragments somewhat.

I feel like if you clean it up too much you can end up having "Dawson's Creek syndrome", where you have ordinary people talking like English professors. Of course, the other extreme could be completely unreadable.

I suppose end of the day you just have to find balance.

 

[Boota]

I write dialogue the way people talk. There is definitely a place for writing grammatically perfect dialogue, but I'm not going to do it. Unless, of course, that character does speak in perfect grammar.

When I write in first person I even leave parts of the narrative grammatically incorrect at times, just because that's how the narrator talks.

 

[Dar~]

I write in the vernacular. I even spell things phonettically so people read them like they sound.

 

[Weird Harold]

Is it better to have your characters talk like real people (i.e. grammatically incorrect, sometimes unclear meanings, slang)

OR

Is it better to clean it up and have somewhat idealized dialog?
...
I suppose end of the day you just have to find balance.

You have to strike a balance between readability and establishing the character. Since Dialogue is, IMHO, the best way to establish character traits, I try to make each character's speaking style unique and appropriate without resorting to trying to phoneteticaly spell odd accents or dialects.

I do, like, use proper grammar, and stuff, you know, but, like it doesn't, you know, work for some characters who, like, can talk for, like, you know, forever, without taking a breath, or something and, like, sometimes, I just have to use, like run-off sentences and stuff.

(PS: I had an editor complain about a speil like that because it made my character sound like a Valley Girl. I responded, "good. That's exactly what I intended.")

 

[Stella_Omega]

Natural dialogue can make or break a story for me, even a porn story. And, sometimes the dialogue can be stilted and over-correct- and sexy. I have one that is in submission right now, that is written in renassance-faire-speak. I thought about putting it in the Elizabethan period, except I love it when the characters break character and drop in a twenty-first-century sentence:

“Methinks twill be best if I tarry not overlong in thy presence, pardner.” Bobby said. “Thou hast much to attend to.” He stretched his legs out.
“Captain, a question for thee.”
“Aye?”
“How shall the maidens deem thy intentions? All the faggots look over their shoulders when thou passeth. They think you look cute.”
“Oh, shut the fuck up!” he snapped.

 

[elsol]

I use very exactly correct grammar in the narration. In dialogue, I relax it... using contractions, incomplete sentences, etc.

I think the very correct narrative style makes the relaxed dialogue seem 'more' natural than it actually is without running into problems of being too natural, regional, or unreadable.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[Stella_Omega]

I use very exactly correct grammar in the narration. In dialogue, I relax it... using contractions, incomplete sentences, etc.

I think the very correct narrative style makes the relaxed dialogue seem 'more' natural than it actually is without running into problems of being too natural, regional, or unreadable.

Sincerely,
ElSol

Very good point, elsol, I agree.
Do you ever narrate in first person, and if so, how do you handle the grammer? I find I stay "correct" while the character narrates, and loosen up again when the character talks.

 

[Liar]

Is it better to have your characters talk like real people (i.e. grammatically incorrect, sometimes unclear meanings, slang)

OR

Is it better to clean it up and have somewhat idealized dialog?

Um... Actually both. At the same time.

My characters speak like people do in general, in half finished sentences, interrupting each other, leaving words out, hesitating, blurting out one-word nonsense and so on. Sometimes I have far too many ellipses than what can be healthy. (Besides, I'm not 100% sure I use them right, Gonna start a thread and find out.) But at the same time, they are all a bunch of witty bastards. You know, saying all those clever things that you think of a minute after you should have said it. They speak to entertain a third party (the reader), not to just communicate between themselves. So it flows a bit better than real life dialouge, but still with the same random structure.

 

[raphy]

Is it better to have your characters talk like real people (i.e. grammatically incorrect, sometimes unclear meanings, slang)

OR

Is it better to clean it up and have somewhat idealized dialog?

Neither is better. Both engender a certain response in your readers. Figure out what you want to achieve with the dialogue, and then elicit that response. Just like in Real Life (tm) *what* you say can be more important than *how* you say it.

 

[Liar]

Just like in Real Life (tm) *what* you say can be more important than *how* you say it.

Dontcha mean the other way round?