Dialogue Confusion
Stories are all about conflict. A great device for explicit conflict is dialogue.
Exercise: Write a scene in which two characters are not understanding one another, even though they may be trying to. As you write, hold on to the confusion for as long as possible; look for ways of further complicating the misunderstanding. The idea is that our experience of the world is incredibly subjective; sometimes bridging the gap from our own perspective to the experiences of others is difficult, sometimes even impossible. It’s a fundamental problem, a real problem.
500 words
page revision: 11, last edited: 04 Mar 2011 04:39