Dialogue as Poetry

Just last week, Padraic published an excellent post on the problems and pitfalls of writing dialogue in fiction. All his advice is applicable to nonfiction as well, where some writers have a tendency to stop remembering what people said and start remembering what they think people should have said. And it's especially important for theatre, which is often predominantly about the dialogue (although there are, of course, some theatre movements/styles which pay more attention to movement and visuals).


But what about poetry? As I've talked about before, there is verse theatre, which is a kind of poetry. Shakespeare adhered to pretty strict rules while writing in iambic pentameter. The neoclassical French playwrights also had their own rules about writing in alexandrines. Otherwise, though, I don't know of a lot of dialogue in poetry (other than limericks).


So, I thought it would be fun to come up with a prompt to play a little more with found poetry, and help you flex your fictional, nonfictional and poetic muscles all at once. Here, then, is your assignment:

1. Go to a public place and eavesdrop. But don't just eavesdrop. Record (in your brain, on your phone, or in writing) a conversation (or several) that you overhear.*
2. Transcribe the conversation if you recorded it electronically or in your brain.
3. Shape it. You may want to print out your transcription and go at it with scissors. You may want to use the Cut and Paste functions in your word processor. You may want to rewrite or retype your transcription in different shapes. You may want to try all three or something else entirely.

This is an exercise in found poetry of a sort, but I hope that the act of transcription will help you see how natural dialogue really sounds. And, in turn, help with your own dialogue writing. I have trouble with this all the time. Even when I'm writing about a conversation that happened a few hours ago, I automatically cut and polish, remove the um's and uh's, the false starts, the "I think– I don't think that's really– You know, the thing is–" before an eloquent thought. And my dialogue often ends up sounding fake. But working closely with dialogue has helped me become more aware of what sounds natural and what doesn't. So go, eavesdrop, flex your poetical muscles and use this exercise to tone your fictional and nonfictional muscles too!


*Note: Recording without consent isn't the most ethical thing to do, so use your discretion. If you subscribe to the idea that, as a writer, you sometimes have to do unethical things for the sake of art (i.e. air people's private business in public), the sky's the limit. But, if you're uncomfortable with the very idea of recording, find some students discussing homework, or coworkers discussing recipes in the breakroom. Find a situation that likely won't involve sensitive information and record that. You'll still get just as much material.

Find more of Rukmini's excellent articles on Floodmark.