Showing Versus Telling - Three Steps to Getting it Right

Instead of Telling

One thing almost every new writer hears is to "show not tell." Okay, great. but what does that mean? I thought I was showing.

Apparently not.

I didn't understand showing versus telling until I attended a writer's conference with my son. At 17, he was hesitant to wander a strange campus on his own, so instead of attending my "real writer" sessions, I went to his screen writing sessions. It was one of the best inconveniences of my life, because I finally realized what had been missing in my writing.

Movies show. They have to. When a character is sad, a voice doesn't boom, "The news saddened John." No, John hears the news, and his behavior changes. His shoulders slump. His gait shuffles. Tears well in his eyes.

So, in three easy steps, here is how to show, not tell:

1. Pretend you are a movie director and your characters are actors. How would you get an audience to know what your character is thinking or feeling? What would you tell and actor to do? Write your character doing those things.

2. Tell to speed up the story, when showing isn't necessary, or to let your readers know something isn't very important.

3. Show and tell when you want to emphasize a point.

My favorite reference book for showing emotion is The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer's Guide To Character Expression Of course we want to show more than emotion, but it's a good start.

How do you show and not tell?