Expressing Emotions, Part Two: Anger
So. Your character is angry, and you're trying to show, not tell. First of all, congratulations! You're trying to improve the story (and your writing skill) by learning how to show and not tell.
As I mentioned in my last blog post, showing is more difficult than telling, since you have to lead your readers to come to the correct conclusion without actually saying what you want them to think. This means showing body language, tone of voice, facial expression, and physical actions rather than saying "they were angry."
The first thing you need to do is decide what your character's typical response to anger is. If you have a detailed character bio you should have something to start with; if not, then how they express emotions is a great place to start!
Anger is a very passionate and heated emotion. People who are angry often do or say things that under normal circumstances they wouldn't. (Remember the last time you said something you didn't mean during an argument?) Changes in behavior as well as physical differences are an easy and dependable way to demonstrate anger without flat-out telling someone. That's what we're going to focus on today.
Physical Differences
The body sometimes changes when a person is angry. Some of these changes are:reddening faceclenched handstense musclesgrinding teethnegative facial expression
Changes in Behavior
Changes in behavior often occur when someone is angry. Someone who may normally not be destructive might throw things, or hit things; for example:yellingfoul languagethreatsthrowing thingsslamming doorsstomping feetinsultsviolence
Keeping in mind that for these to be shown as a break from your character's normal, you need to establish what their normal is. It is possible to have a character that normally uses foul language, or stomps their feet. In that case, those things may not be an indicator of anger for that particular character. Your readers need to be able to tell that this is a departure from normal in some way, even if that's not made obvious until later in the story.
In addition, there are other signs of anger that you may use to describe a character:flashing eyestone of voice (angry, like a growl, hiss, snarl)internal dialogue (what the character is thinking)description of feelings (stomach roiling, a red-hot wave, a strong desire to break something)the reactions of other characters (backing away, silence, averted eyes, fear)character dialogue (someone asking what's wrong, saying they look upset, etc.)
So rather than just saying that your character is angry, describe what their body is doing, how their voice sounds, what the people around them are doing, and what they're doing.
Challenge: Describe a scene in which a character is angry without using the words angry, furious, or mad.
As I mentioned in my last blog post, showing is more difficult than telling, since you have to lead your readers to come to the correct conclusion without actually saying what you want them to think. This means showing body language, tone of voice, facial expression, and physical actions rather than saying "they were angry."
The first thing you need to do is decide what your character's typical response to anger is. If you have a detailed character bio you should have something to start with; if not, then how they express emotions is a great place to start!
Anger is a very passionate and heated emotion. People who are angry often do or say things that under normal circumstances they wouldn't. (Remember the last time you said something you didn't mean during an argument?) Changes in behavior as well as physical differences are an easy and dependable way to demonstrate anger without flat-out telling someone. That's what we're going to focus on today.
Physical Differences
The body sometimes changes when a person is angry. Some of these changes are:reddening faceclenched handstense musclesgrinding teethnegative facial expression
Changes in Behavior
Changes in behavior often occur when someone is angry. Someone who may normally not be destructive might throw things, or hit things; for example:yellingfoul languagethreatsthrowing thingsslamming doorsstomping feetinsultsviolence
Keeping in mind that for these to be shown as a break from your character's normal, you need to establish what their normal is. It is possible to have a character that normally uses foul language, or stomps their feet. In that case, those things may not be an indicator of anger for that particular character. Your readers need to be able to tell that this is a departure from normal in some way, even if that's not made obvious until later in the story.
In addition, there are other signs of anger that you may use to describe a character:flashing eyestone of voice (angry, like a growl, hiss, snarl)internal dialogue (what the character is thinking)description of feelings (stomach roiling, a red-hot wave, a strong desire to break something)the reactions of other characters (backing away, silence, averted eyes, fear)character dialogue (someone asking what's wrong, saying they look upset, etc.)
So rather than just saying that your character is angry, describe what their body is doing, how their voice sounds, what the people around them are doing, and what they're doing.
Challenge: Describe a scene in which a character is angry without using the words angry, furious, or mad.
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