On dialogue tags

You know all about dialogue tags, right? They're the words we use to indicate who said something and (sometimes) how they said it. And among writers, most of the controversy surrounding dialogue tags comes from the latter. In particular, there's a vehement school of thought that says if the dialogue itself is good enough, everything the reader needs to know about how it was said is automatically implied – in which case, 'said' is the only dialogue tag a writer should ever need. But is that true? This week I'm going to explore the question … with a little help from Frank Loesser.

To start with, let's load up our text with every possible descriptive tag and modifier we can get our hands on. Here's a piece of dialogue as it might be written by a school student who's been told to show off their vocabulary.

    "I really can't stay," she whispered softly.
    "Baby, it's cold outside," he responded with a wolfish grin.
    "I've got to go away," she protested half-heartedly.
    "Baby, it's cold outside," he repeated insistently.
    "This evening has been –" she began tentatively.
    "Been hoping that you'd drop in," he interposed in a seductive murmur.
    "– so very nice," she concluded shyly.
    "I'll hold your hands, they're just like ice," he reassured her, enclosing her delicate fingers in his strong, capable palms.

I think we can all agree this isn't very good. Each of the short pieces of dialogue is so overloaded with descriptive words that it's hard to keep track of what's being said. The insistence on a different dialogue tag for every line, and on modifying them with unnecessary adverbs ('whispered softly' being a prime example), draws the reader's eye away from the core of the scene – namely, the conversation. This writer may think he's bringing his text to life, but he's actually distracting everyone from the action by bludgeoning them over the head with a large thesaurus.

Now let's take it to the other extreme. Here's the same dialogue, using only the single dialogue tag approved by the militant anti-modifier brigade.

    "I really can't stay," she said.
    "Baby, it's cold outside," he said.
    "I've got to go away," she said.
    "Baby, it's cold outside," he said.
    "This evening has been –" she said.
    "Been hoping that you'd drop in," he said.
    "– so very nice," she said.
    "I'll hold your hands, they're just like ice," he said.

'Said' is meant to be the invisible dialogue tag, in that – unlike the previous example – it doesn't draw the reader's eye away from the meat of the conversation. But as this example proves, if 'said' is used enough then it becomes just as much of a distraction. That's what you get for following a so-called rule slavishly. (Obviously I'm being slavish to the point of imbecilic here, and I really doubt any serious writer would go this far, but you get my point.)

Of course, using a dialogue tag isn't the only way to identify a speaker. It's possible to write the same conversation without any tags at all, using action to take their place.

    "I really can't stay." She folded her arms. In response, his mouth curled in a leer.
    "Baby, it's cold outside."
    He was insufferable. She shook her head firmly and started for the door. "I've got to go away."
    "Baby, it's cold outside." He stepped into her path. She sighed, summoning up her last reserve of politeness.
    "This evening has been …"
    "Been hoping that you'd drop in." Now the man had the gall to interrupt her. Her jaw clenched as she grated out the end of her meaningless pleasantry.
    "… so very nice."
    "I'll hold your hands, they're just like ice." He reached out to suit his actions to his words.
    She slapped him.

This approach can add a lot more information to a scene, but avoiding dialogue tags completely can soon become awkward and unwieldy. And, of course, with every new action that's added, the conversation is becoming less the rapid exchange it started out as, and more a series of insights into the point-of-view character. That can be good, but it can also be bad – again, there's an element of attention being drawn away from the dialogue by everything that's happening around it.

In which case, it would be reasonable to ask, why not cut right back on all that other stuff? Here's the same scene with the minimum amount of 'other stuff' required for the reader to identify who's talking.

    "I really can't stay," she whispered. He shrugged.
    "Baby, it's cold outside."
    "I've got to go away …"
    "Baby, it's cold outside."
    She sighed. "This evening has been –"
    "Been hoping that you'd drop in."
    "– so very nice."
    "I'll hold your hands," he said. "They're just like ice."

The obvious advantage of this approach is that the focus is on the dialogue. And once the dialogue is allowed to take centre stage, it brings its own subtleties of meaning to the scene – subtleties that were previously overwhelmed by the gaudy trappings. Because I'm using song lyrics rather than a genuine piece of dialogue here, I'd argue that this conversation alone isn't enough to convey the writer's intent (there are many ways to interpret what's going on in this scene, not all of them particularly pleasant). But I'd concede that in a scene containing carefully crafted and nuanced dialogue, much of the surrounding framework can be stripped back to the bare essentials.

Based on the above, I do think it's worth paring a problematic scene down to just dialogue and rebuilding from there. That way, you get to see (i) where the dialogue stands alone, (ii) where it could be strengthened in order to stand alone, and (iii) where a dialogue tag/modifier/action is still required to make your meaning clear. Yet I'm pretty sure that in most scenes, there will be some bits that fall into category (iii). Because my personal opinion, as a writer and as an editor, is that no one method of attributing dialogue is sufficient on its own. A lot depends on an author's individual style. A lot depends on what he or she is trying to convey. And while I agree that less is often more in this context, it's simply wrong to insist that 'said' is the only dialogue tag that should ever be used. As with so many aspects of writing, the best approach seems to be

I. Know the 'rules'.
II. Break them as necessary.

And for what it's worth, here's my favourite version of the scene.

    "I really can't stay," she whispered. In response, he stepped between her and the door.
    "Baby, it's cold outside."
    "I've got to go away …"
    "Baby, it's cold outside."
    "This evening – has been –" Now her breath was coming in gasps. Sensing victory, he leaned towards her.
    "Been hoping that you'd drop in," he murmured.
    "– so – very – nice –"
    "I'll hold your hands." He did so, then frowned. "They're just like ice …"
    He screamed as she sank her fangs into his throat.

With thanks (and apologies) to Frank Loesser and Baby, It's Cold Outside.