10 Commandments of Dialogue

December 13, 2009

1.- You shall love the use of dialogue, and use every opportunity in writing to make others to dialogue among themselves.

2.- You shall love to dialogue, instead of simply writing just boring and undue narration.

3.- You shall not use complicated images or figures of speech when writing a dialogue. Stay simple, and remain simple in your dialogue. Don’t make a dialogue too long. After every character’s intervention simply say: –he said, or –she said.

4.- You shall not be inclined to be pompous or too much ambivalent in your dialogue.

5.- You shall always be careful and love and keep the tracking of your dialogue, so as not to lose your perspective of things.

6.- You shall not overuse the name of your characters in vain when you place them in direct dialogue, except when there are more than two personages exchanging their views.

7.- You shall rest from dialogue by placing bits of narration in between.

8.- You shall write six days a week for at least an hour and shall do your writer’s work therein.

9.- You shall try to earn some money by writing, so you shall take care of your family. Otherwise, see that you shall do some extra work on the side.

10.- The rest is just narration.