The hubby – a non reader but trying to change that – and I were talking online recently about novels, when he mentioned how he doesn’t like dramatic writing in a book. Example (not a quote from a book) “I could taste his fear as he cowered before me. It coated my tongue, my mouth, like liquid. Bitter, and acidic”. To him, it makes the story, comic bookesque. It’s not that he doesn’t like comics, he does, he just doesn’t like that same ‘voice’ in a novel. He said it was the same thing as me getting annoyed with overly dramatic acting in a movie.
I tried to explain to him that there is a massive difference between book drama and movie/acting drama. When someone is speaking to you, you have facial expressions, tone of voice, gestures, etc., that tell you how important the situation is. With just the words on paper to go off of, you need extra descriptions, extra emphasis on things, aka dramatic flare, to show importance. Otherwise the reader can’t feel it, which makes the story flat. You need a certain level of theatrics to make a story come alive.
I did say that there is such thing as too much in a novel, just like in a movie. I’m not arguing that part. I’ve read books that were so descriptive with movements/actions/thoughts that it bogged down the story so badly I couldn’t continue. I’m arguing that there is a need for dramatic writing in a novel and that it is NOT the same thing as over acting in a movie.
He didn’t agree that there was a difference. I told him, he’s the lucky winner of another LE rant. Am I alone in thinking there is a difference? Or that there is a need for some theatrics in writing?
