The following is excerpted from Evalogue.Life. To read the full article, CLICK HERE.
Should you include dialogue in your memoir, autobiography, or family history? What if you don’t remember exactly what people said? In this article, we’ll address these questions with practical tips for how to write dialogue in a true story.
Dialogue can add such richness to a scene and flavor to a character’s personality that I try to use this technique often (but not too much). Another good reason to use dialogue is that it breaks up long pages. In The Memoir Workbook, C.S. Lakin says, “Dialogue adds ‘white space’ to our pages, makes the reading move quickly and helps keep our story from becoming cumbersome.” When done well, dialogue is rich, interesting, and keeps the pace of the story clipping along.
Here is an overview with quick rules for writing dialogue in true stories like memoirs. Keep reading for the ins and outs of each rule.
Rules for writing dialogue in a true story at a glance
- Honor the emotional truth.
- Trim the fat. Make it authentic for the person, only better.
- Don’t cram back story into dialogue.
- Break dialogue up with action.
- Each character should have their own way of speaking (Stephen King’s dialogue test).
- Include local vernacular and slang from a time and place.
To read the full article, CLICK HERE.