The Purposes of Dialogue; #1B - Using SUBTEXT to Show Intention
In the previous blog entry, I spoke about the five basic purposes of dialogue in fiction: To illustrate INTENTION (illuminating character goals, sometimes directly expressed but otherwise through sub-text); to allow ACTION v. REACTION, creating a progressive dynamic in your story; to illustrate RELATIONSHIPS, answering the question of Emotional Control -- who has it and why?; to provide VOICE (illuminating character origins & background, attitudes, state-of-mind); and to provide EXPOSITION.
Using the example of Chapter 30 in Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, I explored the author's use of highly literal expressions of intention on the part of the principal male character, Count Vronsky, soon to be Anna's partner in her adulterous affair. But in the scene that follows, Chapter 31, intentions are NOT expressed in a literal manner through dialogue. Instead, this awkward scene on the St. Petersburg railway platform establishing the love-triangle becomes a study in the superlative art of using non-literal dialogue, or SUBTEXT, to generate tension and move the action forward. Sub text can create irony -- a character means one thing but says another, often the opposite of what he/she is feeling -- or can reveal intense relationships that are masked by intentionally mundane or subdued exchanges.
Both types of subtext apply in this scene, where Anna is greeted home by her husband, the pompous civil servant Karenina, while the man who wants to be her lover, Count Vronksy, is pretending to have followed his mother home from Moscow when he is actually pursuing Anna. There's sexual tension here, rivalry, guilt on the part of Anna, because she flirted with Vronsky in Moscow, and NONE of this is expressed verbally in their very formal dialogue.
To start it off, Vronsky barges into the reunion of husband and wife on the station platform, ignoring the husband and presuming a relationship with the wife by asking Anna, "Have you passed a good night?" He asks this knowing that Anna has not slept a wink because she has been thinking about him, and about their intimate conversation a few hours ago when they stepped out of the train on the snowbound stop-over. As people say now, it's a "dog-whistle," a message to Anna only she can hear, revealing the growing intensity of his feeling for her.
She responds by saying "Thank you, very good," however, Tolstoy tells us that her face looks weary when she says this, belying her statement that's she's "good." In fact, she's a mess!
Anna then has no choice but to introduce Vronsky to her husband Alexey, who is already put off by Vronsky's presumptuous manner, his good looks and his military swagger, no less than his aristocratic title, and stresses his dislike by speaking trite pleasantries expressed so coldly that Vronsky cannot fail to take the hint that he is not wanted. Karenina asks him "You're back from leave, I suppose?" but as Tolstoy writes: "without waiting for a reply, he (Karenina) turned to his wife in a jesting tone: 'Well, were a great many tears shed at parting?' By addressing his wife like this, he gave Vronsky to understand that he wished to be left alone, and, turning slightly towards him, he touched his hat; but Vronsky turned to Anna… 'I hope I may have the honor of calling on you,' he said. Alexey Alexandrovitch glanced with his weary eyes at Vronsky. 'Delighted, he said coldly."
Brrrr! You've been dissed, soldier boy!
As you can see, in some situations, the effect of using dialogue that employs subtext, meaning the opposite of what is felt, ('Delighted'), or forcing the characters to sublimate powerful or conflicted emotions through the utterance of mundane small talk ('I'm very good, thank you,) creates rising tension and spurs the reader to read on while investing in these characters and their plight. Good sub-text can elevate dialogue to the point where it has multiple, nuanced messages for the reader/listener, and advances the story -- narrative -- significantly.
Using the example of Chapter 30 in Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, I explored the author's use of highly literal expressions of intention on the part of the principal male character, Count Vronsky, soon to be Anna's partner in her adulterous affair. But in the scene that follows, Chapter 31, intentions are NOT expressed in a literal manner through dialogue. Instead, this awkward scene on the St. Petersburg railway platform establishing the love-triangle becomes a study in the superlative art of using non-literal dialogue, or SUBTEXT, to generate tension and move the action forward. Sub text can create irony -- a character means one thing but says another, often the opposite of what he/she is feeling -- or can reveal intense relationships that are masked by intentionally mundane or subdued exchanges.
Both types of subtext apply in this scene, where Anna is greeted home by her husband, the pompous civil servant Karenina, while the man who wants to be her lover, Count Vronksy, is pretending to have followed his mother home from Moscow when he is actually pursuing Anna. There's sexual tension here, rivalry, guilt on the part of Anna, because she flirted with Vronsky in Moscow, and NONE of this is expressed verbally in their very formal dialogue.
To start it off, Vronsky barges into the reunion of husband and wife on the station platform, ignoring the husband and presuming a relationship with the wife by asking Anna, "Have you passed a good night?" He asks this knowing that Anna has not slept a wink because she has been thinking about him, and about their intimate conversation a few hours ago when they stepped out of the train on the snowbound stop-over. As people say now, it's a "dog-whistle," a message to Anna only she can hear, revealing the growing intensity of his feeling for her.
She responds by saying "Thank you, very good," however, Tolstoy tells us that her face looks weary when she says this, belying her statement that's she's "good." In fact, she's a mess!
Anna then has no choice but to introduce Vronsky to her husband Alexey, who is already put off by Vronsky's presumptuous manner, his good looks and his military swagger, no less than his aristocratic title, and stresses his dislike by speaking trite pleasantries expressed so coldly that Vronsky cannot fail to take the hint that he is not wanted. Karenina asks him "You're back from leave, I suppose?" but as Tolstoy writes: "without waiting for a reply, he (Karenina) turned to his wife in a jesting tone: 'Well, were a great many tears shed at parting?' By addressing his wife like this, he gave Vronsky to understand that he wished to be left alone, and, turning slightly towards him, he touched his hat; but Vronsky turned to Anna… 'I hope I may have the honor of calling on you,' he said. Alexey Alexandrovitch glanced with his weary eyes at Vronsky. 'Delighted, he said coldly."
Brrrr! You've been dissed, soldier boy!
As you can see, in some situations, the effect of using dialogue that employs subtext, meaning the opposite of what is felt, ('Delighted'), or forcing the characters to sublimate powerful or conflicted emotions through the utterance of mundane small talk ('I'm very good, thank you,) creates rising tension and spurs the reader to read on while investing in these characters and their plight. Good sub-text can elevate dialogue to the point where it has multiple, nuanced messages for the reader/listener, and advances the story -- narrative -- significantly.
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