Dialogue Tags: Saying it right!

Dialogue tags are the words used after a character has spoken, such as "he said", and "she whispered". The most popular tag by far, and with good reason, is 'said'. It's okay to use it over and over. Despite what you might think, it doesn't get repetitious for the reader.

Dialogue tags are very important as they're used to show which character is speaking at any given time. Check out the following very simple example:

"I think this is the way to go," said Sarah.
"Yes, I think so too," said James.
"Hmm ... that other path might be quicker," said Daniel.
"No, I agree with Sarah," said Dawn.

Note that you can say 'said Sarah' or 'Sarah said' as you choose - whever reads better at the time. But don't say 'said he' or 'said she' unless you're deliberately being pretentious and artificial and even old-fashioned.

Now, I'd be the first to admit that the example given is a bit flat and boring to read - you'd never do that in real life. Which leads me on nicely to the trick of using action to vary the tags. So:

"I think we should go this way," Sarah said, pointing.
James nodded. "You're right."
"The other way might be better," Daniel said, determination etched on his face.
"No, I think Sarah's right," Dawn said.

That wasn't much action, and it's not brilliant writing, but even that little bit brought life to the small scene.

We also left out James' dialogue tag entirely, but that was fine - it was perfectly clear from the action that it was him speaking. This is a good trick to minimise the use of dialogue tags. The rule is to use as many as you need, but no more.

If the dialogue sentence is long, make sure to put the dialogue tag in early, even at the price of breaking up the sentence. This is because, if you don't, the reader won't know who to 'listen' to as she's reading the text. So you'd have something like, "Indeed," said Gary, "I think that etc etc etc"

If there are only two people in the scene, you can leave dialogue tags out entirely (or only put one in every fourth or fifth statement in order to keep the reader on track).

For example (say it's already been made clear that Claire and Darren are in the scene):
"Oh you always do that!" said Claire.
"I do not!"
"You do. Every single time."
"I don't, and I resent you saying that."

I only have one tag for the four dialogue sentences, but it's clear who's speaking at any time. It's a good policy to try to minimise the number of dialogue tags you use - but be sure to use as many as you need. If the reader has to stop and read back to figure it out, you've failed. In this example, having only two characters helps with this.

But if you can get it down to two characters, do. That will, as explained above, already help the reader keep track even if you only have a tag every so often.

The other trick is to use description instead of tags. Not only does this cut down on the number of tags, but it helps the reader visualise what's going on. For example:
Claire shook her hair back in frustration, "I'm serious, Darren. I can't bear it when you see her."
Darren raised his eyes to heaven, with a God-give-me-patience expression. "There's nothing to worry about, Claire. I'm totally over her. I'm with you now, after all."
Claire shook her head. "That seems too easy."
Darren sighed and strode over to her. He put his hands on her shoulders. "You are the only woman for me, I swear."

In the previous example, I had each character use the other's name - this further helped to identify the speaker in each case. But be careful with this - only do it where a person would naturally say another's name.

'Said' is the most common tag, and as I explained above you can use it a lot. But there is a place for other tags too. For example, 'asked' (if it's a question, obviously!). And sometimes you can use other, bigger words. For example in the previoius example I could have said:

Claire shook her hair back in frustration, "I'm serious, Darren. I can't bear it when you're out working all the time."
Darren rubbed a tired hand across his forehad. "I know Claire, I know. But we need the money."
Claire shook her head. "Even so," she said.
Darren sighed and strode over to her. He put his hands on her shoulders. "I know. I know you hate it. It's not right," he conceded.

You see here that for four lines I only used two tags, one of which was 'said' and the other of which was 'conceded' - that works because it fits here.

You can also use tags like 'whispered', 'shouted', 'agreed', and 'yelled' as long as they're used in moderation. However, tags such as: 'ejaculated', 'bragged', 'declared' and 'exclaimed should never be used. They're just too purple-prose and they're falling into the trap of telling-not-showing.'

And never use tags like 'smiled', 'laughed' or 'grinned'. You cannot grin a statement.

Best-selling Irish author Tracy Culleton is passionate about helping people achieve their dream of writing success. Her comprehensive website teaching you all you need to know about how to write a novel is well worth a visit, as is her website reviewing and critiquing the various novel writing software products available.

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