Don’t worry about Show vs Tell
That’s right I said it! I click baited you!
But I also think there’s some truth in it, understanding it properly, that is.
All my writing career, every book you pick up on the craft, and on every damn list of ‘How to…’ pertaining to writing has the ole Show vs Tell. And it is true, we should show our readers the world rather than beat them to death with words.
But it’s also a tricky phrase to understand, because aren’t we technically doing the same thing? While one version may be a bit more exciting in readability, yes, we technically are achieving the same result. But why is something so important so hard to define?
It’s a killer catch phrase like smoke and mirrors… and operates in the same way.
It’s a slippery fish.
You as a writer want to strive for clarity and purpose in your writing. The purpose being showing what the character is doing, or how the world is, as succinctly as possible.
But where my understanding shifted was when taking the idea of ‘show’ to mean more than the singular sense. We are literal animals and people after all so saying ‘show’ means well I better show ‘em! Yet show means more than that. It’s the full bouquet of senses and ideas. We want our readers to feel what’s being shown. We want what’s being shown to exert a response. At least that’s my understanding of it.
Hell, does the writer that coined it even get it? Or was it a private joke that went to big? Like the old thirty drafts line…
The thing was Show vs Tell, is it frustrated the crap out of writers because we then see other writers publishing a complete trainwreck of words that somehow make a sentence, mesh with a few others, accidental into a paragraph, then form a story. We think, I’m better than that? Surely… and you might be.
I might be worse, or better, or equal.
I always understood Show vs Tell as a defining metric of either You got it kid, or Ya don’t.
We think those that have a grip on this weapon surely must wield gold. But understanding and utilising Show vs Tell (how many times can I write it in the damn article?) doesn’t necessarily equate literary gold.
When I understood writing, that golden rule aforementioned, and how to get out of the race of comparison, was when I realised it was important what the reader saw.
Now I realise how stupid I sound there, so I’m gonna repeat it. The book is only as good as what the reader sees and perceives and feels.
Whether it’s crap, whether it’s gold, self-published or traditional, if the reader felt something during the story and saw it all, then it’s fine.
At the end of the day each of us are trying to convey what is in our soul onto the page and into someone else’s heart via words. It’s lofty. It feels powerful and dare I say godlike. It’s very easy to tip the scales with pressure and under, or overly, inflated self belief.
All because it means something to us. ‘It’s deep shit man. That’s me your reading’.
But maybe the process of stepping back a little can help you see. Take the telescope off the eye and stop looking for the treasure and see the island.
I gotta do it and I’m a rookie. Can you imagine having a team, an advance, pressure to follow up a bestseller? Forgetaboutitson!
Viewing writing as a trade changed my view. Stepping back and understanding what the reader sees and feels made it less personal, so that it could be more personal. Now whether my writing achieves that is another story, but the attempt is there!
Show vs Tell is a true rule that should be adhered to… but if you don’t get it that’s cool too. Follow your gut and just try and get what’s in your head on the page.
Write about the laser sighted crocodile’s in the river patrolling the creaky old shed with it’s swinging door. Sitting just on the flood line and at the end of a fifty metre mud pit.
All that matters is that people enjoy your ideas.
Who’d a thought?
[image error]
