describing feelings

Here's a link to a writing advice blog on describing feelings in characters:

https://thebusinessofwriting.wordpress.com/2010/04/27/how-to-write-character-emotions/

Gringa said:

Could you please elaborate here a bit more? thanks

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I think it'e been well covered in my absence but...

When a Big Thing happens to you, then two things occur


One, your body responds -- adrenalin, tears, trembling hands etc. These appeal because they seem like shows, and are of a kind, but they get old quick.

Two -- you "show" it in what you do in response to the stimulus, in your actions. And those actions that you do in response are you "you" in a way that a tear running down a cheek or a clenched fist are not (There are places for that tear or that fist, especially showing a non POV character. But if you go past the stock, then you get into character not involuntary response)

Today, I was happy because I found out I am probably (95%) not being made redundant, after being told I would 100% be redundant a week ago. Pharrell Williams came on the radio singing "Happy" and me and my boss sang along and shimmied, very badly, around the shop (and got caught doing so by a customer )

When I am cross I slam doors, shove laundry into the machine with excessive force and slap cups down so the tea slops out. I almost never shout. Sometimes if I am very angry indeed, I can't talk properly -- I stammer because I am too angry to force the words out, and then that makes me even crosser. (If I cry it is almost always because of this. Because I am ANGRY)

When my bipolar plays up and I get depressed, big time, I do not cry (or rarely). I withdraw. When I sit anywhere I am hunched into myself, curled up into a ball to make myself invisible to the world. I sit and stare at things without seeing them

When I am frightened (and sometimes with the bipolar I get extreme anxiety) I say fuck you and do it anyway.


Other people will show their happiness/crossness/sadness in other ways, and it is how you show those ways that shows us their character. Not their involuntary bodily reactions -- they have no control over those -- but their voluntary ones

And that is (one of the ways) where you and your writing become unique.

Anyone can be sad and shed a tear, or be afraid and tremble or whatever. People's bodies and their reactions to emotional stimulus are pretty similar*. That's not to say never use the bodily reactions, but that the actual actions are much more powerful, less stock/cliche




* Ofc if your character has an odd bodily reaction to a stimulus...

Thanks Mr. Flibble- ^^^ Appreciate this explanation.

Roxxsmom said:

I was taught that one should never, ever name emotions. Describe the sensations associated with the emotion and let the reader piece which one it is from the context.

Great advice, except a typical novel is 80-120k words long, and most emotions are associated with a relatively narrow set of internal symptoms. How many times can you describe a flopping/fluttering heart without the reader thinking your character needs a pacemaker, or a churning stomach before it seems like she's got giardia?

Internal voice can help get emotion across too. The words used to describe something, for instance, can tell the reader how the pov character feels about it.

The dog ran up, all lopsided and goofy tongued.

vs

The dog ran up, a tower of bone, muscle, and teeth.


Skimming the novels on my reader, it seems that successful writers do use emotion words, sometimes in conjunction with a symptom "Fear made her heart pound harder."

The secret is to know how to mix and match the different approaches and select one that's suitable for the situation. If you're really in close with your pov, named emotions tend to be distancing. But it's rare for an entire novel to be written that way.

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I agree, there is no one right way. From all the books I've been reading, the least appealing description of emotion was in the kids' series "Warriors" where the POV character feels everything "with a pang" or emotions "washed over him". Using this on occasion is cool and I use it sparingly because those books presented the option, but NOT EVERY OTHER PAGE!!!!!!

Jamesaritchie said:

Describing emotions is almost always bad, and a thesaurus just makes iit worse. Emotions are the classic place for show over tell. If you show how people act when experiencing a given emotion, you have a scene readers will follow. If you describe the emotion itself, you'll say nothing meaningful, and will bore readers to death.

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Except, not all characters show their emotions like they do in soap operas. Everyone being equally obvious, is what would bore me.

Roxxsmom said:

I was taught that one should never, ever name emotions. Describe the sensations associated with the emotion and let the reader piece which one it is from the context.

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In my mind the major valid exception is when the POV character is aware of their emotion(s), especially when aware and struggling to control it. Then, if the character names the emotion to themselves, well, that's the character thinking thus is really a form of show.

Reziac said:

In my mind the major valid exception is when the POV character is aware of their emotion(s), especially when aware and struggling to control it. Then, if the character names the emotion to themselves, well, that's the character thinking thus is really a form of show.

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Thanks. I just did this in my WIP and got the standard, "Don't name emotions," from my crit partner. But my character was having conflicting emotions, so I think it was natural for her to reflect, "What the fuck am I feeling?" (Those weren't the literal words in the text.)

Mr Flibble said:

Stop making me agree with you! But I agree.

If the character cries, the reader doesn't need to...(Who the hell said that? Can't recall. Also brings to mind the end of the Conan film...*sniff*)

Show what they do, not what their body does.

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If you can't 'cry' in writing, how else are you supposed to show tears of joy or tears of sadness without going into the cliché of "Smeared mascara"? 'Water pours from her eyes'? 'Red bags hang from her eyes'? Where does the cliché meet cry come into play?

Kessar said:

If you can't 'cry' in writing, how else are you supposed to show tears of joy or tears of sadness without going into the cliché of "Smeared mascara"? 'Water pours from her eyes'? 'Red bags hang from her eyes'? Where does the cliché meet cry come into play?

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That is not the point of the quote

Yes sometimes characters cry

But often you are better served by showing their upset in a way that is different.


X cried because Y was dead is bland and basically crap unless under specific circs.

Consider these

X cried because Y was dead

X wandered around the room they had shared, touching the things that linked them. That stupid ashtray from Margate, from the day they'd first admitted they loved each other. The little plastic donkey where if you pulled the tail a chocolate raisin fell out of its arse, and X had laughed like a loon every time. The knowledge that [POV] would never have any of that again, not in the now, only in the past. He sat in the chair and tried not to think any of that. And failed.

Show

Don't tell

Crying is not forbidden -- but ny saying a character cried you miss opportunities to actually show the character.

X cried is telling, even if you embellish it with "big round drops splatted off her face" Still telling

Roxxsmom said:

Great advice, except a typical novel is 80-120k words long, and most emotions are associated with a relatively narrow set of internal symptoms. How many times can you describe a flopping/fluttering heart without the reader thinking your character needs a pacemaker, or a churning stomach before it seems like she's got giardia?

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That's why I prefer to have them *do* something. It isn't nearly as monotonous and you still follow the (excellent) advice of not naming the emotion.

Characters are always able to do. When you have a flopping/fluttering heart, how do you act? I am usually restless. I tend to do things that don't need doing, like cleaning things that don't need to be cleaned or whatever. Very few of us, imo, sit around feeling but not doing. Our emotions affect our actions.

And if your character breaks a window I'm going to know he or she is angry. Or, for a more subdued example, sits and stares at a pencil before snapping it.

morngnstar said:

Thanks. I just did this in my WIP and got the standard, "Don't name emotions," from my crit partner. But my character was having conflicting emotions, so I think it was natural for her to reflect, "What the fuck am I feeling?" (Those weren't the literal words in the text.)

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And I have a character who for a time suffers from uncontrollable irrational anger -- and he's aware of it, and that it doesn't seem to have a source. When it suddenly comes upon him he just acts on it without thought, and between these fits he sometimes thinks about it, thus names it to himself.

Roxxsmom said:

The secret is to know how to mix and match the different approaches and select one that's suitable for the situation.

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I think this is really key. Too much repetition of style and you get predictable.

I like Roxxmom's suggestion of using the tone of your descriptions to basically invoke the feelings that your character is feeling. If you read about being charged by "a tower of bone muscle and teeth," you should hopefully be jolted by that, and would infer that the POV character felt similarly. Unless, perhaps, you know something about your character that might effect their response. If they were raised by wolves, they might not be afraid by that, whereas a character with a pathological fear of dogs would react differently. In which case, you might need to build on what you've told the reader earlier in the story about your character, or else just trust them to put the pieces together.

There's always physical descriptions. I remember there's a line in Harry Potter that always stuck with me, it was something like, "Harry felt as though an ice cube had slipped into his stomach at the very thought of it." Far more invocative than, "Harry was afraid," this line describes the actual experience in a physical way. Plus it describes a more specific kind of fear. It indicates a kind of cold dread, rather than a blind panic or a heart-stopping shock. Specificity is always your friend.

And you can always describe a character's reactions, which will tell the reader how their feeling the same way we know how people are feeling around us by observing them. "Cheryl's hands were shaking. She swallowed and bit her lip."
That, plus the context of the situation as you read it and your prior knowledge of the character and how she reacts to things, will tell you a lot.

Edit: Just read the debate in this thread over whether it's acceptable to straight up say the emotion. I would have to agree that it's acceptable, but dangerous territory. It's too easy and simple to just say, "John was angry." But if you do use emotion-words, it's probably better to elaborate further with the sentence, perhaps with figurative language to make it come alive. "Rita felt anger spark up in her gut, blazing hotter with every impudent word out of Carl's mouth." Would be better than, "Rita got angrier and angrier as she listened to Carl."

Discord said:

Edit: Just read the debate in this thread over whether it's acceptable to straight up say the emotion. I would have to agree that it's acceptable, but dangerous territory. It's too easy and simple to just say, "John was angry." But if you do use emotion-words, it's probably better to elaborate further with the sentence, perhaps with figurative language to make it come alive. "Rita felt anger spark up in her gut, blazing hotter with every impudent word out of Carl's mouth." Would be better than, "Rita got angrier and angrier as she listened to Carl."

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Yep. That way it has a rationale for the reader and some meaning for the character/situation; it doesn't just plop there like a turd on the page.

First piece of advice comes from Dwight V. Swain and just about every other book of advice on writing fiction: in order for you to convey emotion to the reader, you have to feel it while you write it.

My second piece of advice is to learn to turn off your "filter" while you're writing it. You as the writer of the story turn yourself off. Conscious thought goes away. No judgment. No goals. No worries about writing advice books. Just let your fingers type it out, and see what happens.

Katharine Tree said:

First piece of advice comes from Dwight V. Swain and just about every other book of advice on writing fiction: in order for you to convey emotion to the reader, you have to feel it while you write it.

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Er...no. Or I'd have murdered many people by now, while writing a character in a murderous rage...or while writing that character who is in fact clinically insane would have sent me to the nuthatch

You do need to empathise with their feelings. You don't need to be them, or feel exactly what they feel.

Mr Flibble said:

You do need to empathise with their feelings. You don't need to be them, or feel exactly what they feel.

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From Mirriam-Webster (so excuse the American spelling; some of us are savages):

em·pa·thize
verb \ˈem-pə-ˌthīz\

to have the same feelings as another person
http://absolutewrite.com//www.pinterest.com/pin/create/extension/

Not wanting to clutter the forum with a secluded thread for the question: how would one call/describe that smile that you make when you can't believe something totally absurd and surreal, in a strictly negative way? Like the thief of your car telling you that you should thank him for having totalled it because otherwise they'd still have to pay insurance for it.
Like when your eyes are so wide you feel the cold air around the eyeballs, and your mouth is twitching to grin right up to your ears as you fantasize about stabbing the person.

Is there a name for it?

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

Not wanting to clutter the forum with a secluded thread for the question: how would one call/describe that smile that you make when you can't believe something totally absurd and surreal, in a strictly negative way? Like the thief of your car telling you that you should thank him for having totalled it because otherwise they'd still have to pay insurance for it.
Like when your eyes are so wide you feel the cold air around the eyeballs, and your mouth is twitching to grin right up to your ears as you fantasize about stabbing the person.

Is there a name for it?

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You should use this:

Like when your eyes are so wide you feel the cold air around the eyeballs, and your mouth is twitching to grin right up to your ears as you fantasize about stabbing the person.

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Katharine Tree said:

From Mirriam-Webster (so excuse the American spelling; some of us are savages):

em·pa·thize
verb \ˈem-pə-ˌthīz\

to have the same feelings as another person
http://absolutewrite.com//www.pinterest.com/pin/create/extension/

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Whereas all my dictionaries say to "understand" the feelings of another

you can do one without the other.

From the wiki (I know! But it is at least a base to work from) dictionary

Empathy is the capacity to understand what another person is experiencing from within the other person's frame of reference, ie, the capacity to place oneself in another's shoes.

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Now, imagining yourself in someone else's shows is not the same as feeling what they do -- it can be, but you do not have to feel the need to murder your neighbour to understand why someone else did so.

I do not need to feel murderous rage to write someone feeling that. I need only to understand why they do

Otherwise I am only writing myself. Where's the fun in that? I write to understand other people, not populate my novels with dopplegangers of me.

buzhidao said:

You should use this:

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Actually I did, is why I'm asking LOL

Nadir's eyes were painfully wide and his mouth twitched for an incredulous smile as he ripped Ameer's thinning roll of paper towels into tiny pieces, sheet by sheet.

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

Not wanting to clutter the forum with a secluded thread for the question: how would one call/describe that smile that you make when you can't believe something totally absurd and surreal, in a strictly negative way? Like the thief of your car telling you that you should thank him for having totalled it because otherwise they'd still have to pay insurance for it.
Like when your eyes are so wide you feel the cold air around the eyeballs, and your mouth is twitching to grin right up to your ears as you fantasize about stabbing the person.

Is there a name for it?

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I do that thing. Not easy to explain to a pissed-off person that no, I'm not laughing at them, I have a weird physical response to distress.

They're hard to explain, huh? The reader can probably understand fake smiles, happy smiles, and sad smiles, but "I'm so angry why is my face smiling" smiles are hard. I like the description you wrote, though.

Off the cuff?

The smile wasn't pleasant -- the smile of a shark, a killer, a snake who wanted only to stab with tooth or fang and see the end of the one he smiled at

The smile of a man with no conscience at all

What?

Mr Flibble said:

I write to understand other people, not populate my novels with dopplegangers of me.

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Though there could be a story there too. A world filled with doppelgangers of myself. That might lead to murder very quickly indeed.

Related to "feeling emotions," I ran across this article the other day. It might not answer the question of when and whether it's appropriate to describe the sensations associated with an emotion or not, but I thought it was interesting.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/201...tions-on-the-body-love-makes-us-warm-all-over

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

Not wanting to clutter the forum with a secluded thread for the question: how would one call/describe that smile that you make when you can't believe something totally absurd and surreal, in a strictly negative way? Like the thief of your car telling you that you should thank him for having totalled it because otherwise they'd still have to pay insurance for it.
Like when your eyes are so wide you feel the cold air around the eyeballs, and your mouth is twitching to grin right up to your ears as you fantasize about stabbing the person.

Is there a name for it?

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I was going to say incredulous...until I saw the bottom part. Now I want to change it to psychotic.