“If I\u2019ve said it once, I\u2019ve said it a hundred times…”<\/p>\n
You\u2019ve probably heard it before and you\u2019ll hear it again: fiction imitates life, but it\u2019s not a perfect reflection of it. It\u2019s the reason why we don\u2019t write out every \u2018um\u2019 and \u2018uh\u2019 and \u2018like\u2019 in dialogue. It\u2019s why we generally frown on coincidences and randomness and Deus Ex Machina<\/i>, despite the fact that random weird stuff happens all the time in the real world.<\/p>\n
Another thing that happens a lot in real life is repetition. Stacey and I will decide to go out for coffee on Friday at two. A few days later I\u2019ll forget the time and call her up to double-check. And then Fridayrolls around and I might call her again\u2014\u201cwe still meeting at two?\u201d We see the same funny pictures reposted a dozen times on Facebook. The same inspirational quotes repeated on Twitter. On the first day of school, you\u2019re read a nearly identical syllabus in every class you set foot in.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s life\u2014but fiction isn\u2019t a perfect reflection of life. Often, I\u2019ll see writers spelling out what\u2019s already obvious, or repeating important details just in case the reader didn\u2019t catch them the first time around. And it makes sense; sometimes when you\u2019re having a conversation, you need to do the same, in case the other person was zoning out or distracted or didn\u2019t hear you. But the readers trust you, the writer, to be careful and deliberate about the words you use. They know that characters who are named and described will be important later on. They know you\u2019re not going to spend their time on something that isn\u2019t worth their attention. In turn, it\u2019s important to trust them to catch details and clues as they arise.<\/p>\n
Now, what I\u2019m describing isn\u2019t the same thing as foreshadowing and setting up Chekov\u2019s guns\u2014in which case I do recommend repetition. For example, if the evil dragon will eventually be defeated by his wheat gluten allergy, I\u2019d recommend bringing it up at least twice before then. Maybe as throwaway lines, like including the burning of barley fields along with the dragon\u2019s other destruction, or seemingly unrelated anecdotes, like the dragon roasting a servant who asked if he wanted his soup in a bread bowl. In the case of Chekov\u2019s guns, subtle repetition can ensure that the reader doesn\u2019t feel like the ending came out of nowhere.<\/p>\n
In both cases, the appropriate use (or disuse) of repetition is all about forming a partnership with your reader. It\u2019s about giving them just enough detail to let them figure things out on their own, but not enough to make them feel like they\u2019re being spoon-fed information. Trust in your reader\u2019s intelligence\u2014after all, they picked up your book, didn\u2019t they?<\/p>\n
JW Troemner is a freelance editor and unpublished author haunting the shelves of used bookstores in Indianapolis.<\/em><\/p>\n “If I\u2019ve said it once, I\u2019ve said it a hundred times…” You\u2019ve probably heard it before and you\u2019ll hear it again: fiction imitates life, but it\u2019s not a perfect reflection of it. It\u2019s the reason why we don\u2019t write out every \u2018um\u2019 and \u2018uh\u2019 and \u2018like\u2019 in dialogue. It\u2019s why we generally frown on coincidences […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[30,55,42,38,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dialogue","category-guest-post","category-plot","category-symbolism","category-writing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2YHlB-cD","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=783"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":786,"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783\/revisions\/786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rachelhorwitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}