How to Write Good Dialogue — an Ultimate Guide
Boost your dialogue with these key principles
One line of dialogue that rings true reveals character in a way that pages of description can’t — Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Doesn’t it make you want to pull your hair out?
You’ve tried so many iterations of the same scene but the characters sound half-way between robots and idiots, speaking in a way that doesn’t sound humanlike, which is your main goal.
You’ve tried fancy words but they just make the robotic idiot sound like an intellectual robotic idiot. You’ve added a ton of emotions and still, the dialogue remains flat. You wonder to yourself, how can this dialogical beast be tamed?
Contrary to what you may believe, writing good dialogue is easy. Yes, you read that right. Not only is it easy, but it is learnable. No, you do not have to have a special talent for writing dialogue, nor do you need to write five bad drafts before you stumble upon good dialogue.
Like every learnable skill in life, there are core principles that guide proper execution. In this article, take an intellectual journey into the inner workings of dialogue to understand what makes them work and how to write one.
