Write Better By Writing Less

I’m taking a course on film editing right now. Lots of what we’re learning can be applied to other creative arts as well, including writing. The other day we talked about the role of the audience (and the editor) in creating the story. Here’s how it works in video:

1. Show a shot of an actor.
2. Cut to a shot of a bowl of soup.
3. Cut back to actor.

You the viewer now assume there is a relationship between the actor and the soup. In fact you go further, assuming the actor is going to eat the soup (because that’s what people do with soup), or perhaps decline to eat the soup for some reason. But none of that is actually on screen. You could replace the shot of the soup with a shot of a woman and we would draw different conclusions. The audience fills in the gaps without even realizing they’re making this mental leap.

In TRUE AND FALSE (a sort of how-to for professional actors), David Mamet references an argument that for this reason  film is superior to theatre as a storytelling medium. On stage we see the action played out, or the action is alluded to in a fashion that we can understand. On screen, cuts from one thing to another leave a gap in the action that the audience fills in. By filling in these bits of narrative the audience creates part of the story in their own head. They are more involved in the story because they are, without realizing it, telling it to themselves. This subtle involvement helps us suspend our disbelief and become engrossed in the movie. Many films today do away with subtlety and the audience only fills in practical details, as with the bowl of soup. A more sophisticated film, however, can leave more unsaid, leave the vaguest of hints, requiring more involvement from the audience but offering a bigger payoff to viewers who pick up on the film’s deeper meaning.

Pictured: not-so-subtle filmmaking.

Speaking of theatre: Samuel Beckett used to write his scripts in French, then translate them back to English. He wrote this way because his French wasn’t very good (I’m not trying to hate on Beckett. His French was definitely better than mine). Writing in a language he didn’t know forced him to use simple language and write with clarity.

Ahh, see where I’m going with this?

Newish writers are repeatedly told “show, don’t tell.” It is easy to follow the letter of this law and miss the spirit. Instead of writing “Jane was sad” you write “Jane turned away and wiped her eyes.” But that’s the same thing. You’re still telling the reader that Jane was sad in a predictable, transparent fashion. It looks like you’re writing action now, but really it’s still exposition–just because a character is moving doesn’t mean they’re taking an action. A sentence like that doesn’t draw the reader in, because it doesn’t require them to draw conclusions, to fill in the gaps.

"Oo! What gesture will he make next?"

Leave stuff out. Leave out the gestures, the conversational affectations, the colorful descriptions. Emphasize the action, because if you’re writing compelling fiction the action will advance the plot and reveal depth of character and relationship. If you give your reader compelling action they’ll fill in the parts you left out without realizing it, and in the process grow more involved in your story. Give your reader room to tell part of the story to themselves.