Anyway, isn't 'said' one of those words your brain registers and doesn't notice, so it doesn't matter how many times you use it? I don't worry about it. As snoink has already said (haha) it can be rather distracting to have all these different words. It makes you notice something you otherwise wouldn't.
Constantly using other words loses the effect you are aiming for, just like if you dressed in a weird way every day people would eventually stop noticing or caring. So keep them for special occasions, no?
It's not easy having a good time. Even smiling makes my face ache.
Kudos to those that skip right over "said" in dialogue. It drives me nuts. Especially if it's in front of the dialogue.
The thing I do is action tags before the dialogue. In my opinion, if you have done your job as a writer then people should know how your character will say a certain line through actions alone. The only time I use "said" or any other equivilent is when I'm unsure if people will know how a character is saying something, or if they say it quietly.
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo
Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
Lectured, advised, mused, stated, whispered, breathed, shrieked, squealed, shouted, yelled, retorted, screamed, snapped, laughed, exclaimed, snorted, muttered, mumbled, stuttered, stammered, gasped, told, asked, answered, replied, way too many more.
Personally, if it's a dialogue between two characters, I skip any form of said overall. I agree with Icaruss that it makes it flow better. You only use those words if you want to describe how something was said. For example:
"Shush," I said.
"Shush," I hissed.
"Watch out!" I said.
"Watch out!" I shrieked.
See the difference?
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
NO. You should never use even a quarter of those words. Seriously ejaculated. My biggest pet peeve as a writer is needles tags. Said is an invisible word if you have it in work the reader glosses over it and gets to the next part. If you have one of these tags the reader has to imagine that specific form of said and for a brief moment they are taken out of the story. I'm not saying you can't use them at all just be aware that the use of them isn't just to change it up it's to get a point across.
Last edited by PhoenixBishop on Tue Jan 27, 2009 5:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"said" isn't an annoying word unless you overanalyze it (such as what typically happens when people are editing writing, myself included). Using words like "laughed" "growled" "grumbled" shouldn't take the place of it too often in dialogue as it tends to draw out what someone's saying and slow down the conversation. Use it well, but use it sparingly.
There's also a good way of doing a mix of several different elements like this:
"How did you manage to blow up the machine?" she asked, her eyes widening.
"It wasn't like I did it on purpose," the woman answered. "It was more of an accident."
"How did you accidentally blow up the machine, then?"
"I don't know, it just sort of happened."
"Then why do you think I'll do it?"
"Because," the woman said with a smile. "You and I are more alike than you realize.
Something like this is relatively easy to follow and is sparing on the "said"s without weighing it down with substitutions.
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If you cut out tags like that then you get what's called talking heads. It could be considered worse then an overuse of said because it drives readers out of the story as they try to keep track of who's speaking. When you cut "said" or any tag like it, you should replace it with an action tag.
But, I agree that a blend is the way to go. In my current work I'm using a blend of "said" tags (or equivalents) and action tags that's working out quite nicely. ^_^
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo
Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
Cutting out tags only makes the conversation confusing if it is three way, or one character speaks twice, or you don't say who talked first. For the simple statement/answer conversation, I tend to cut tags...
It's not easy having a good time. Even smiling makes my face ache.
Even in a two-way conversation that pulls me right out. Ever since I read a story where there was a solid page of two-way, tagless conversation (and it was mindspeak, so the POV character's words didn't have quotes and the other character's did) I have detested any sort of dropped tags. I can stand it for two lines, sometimes three, but not more.
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo
Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
