The Power of Unspoken Words: How to Write Subtext in Fiction

[From KMW: I’m taking a quick sabbatical this week. I’ll be back next Monday with a post/podcast about “The Disillusionment Arc in Storytelling: A Powerful Tool for Character Growth.” Until then, I hope you enjoy this short post on the important topic of how to write subtext in fiction!] One of the…
https://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/how-to-write-subtext-in-fiction/

#Prose #showdonttell #subtext
@indieauthors

t-shirt idea: ask me about my #subtext

The #author of #OG #Wicked #novel #confirms #lesbian #subtext between #Glinda and #Elphaba is #intentional

#Author #GregoryMaguire said in a recent #interview with #Them that he “wanted to give that level of #complexity to #Oz” for it to be “#believable” – this “included #sexualorientation and #sexual #diversity”.

#Women #Lesbians #Transgender #LGBTQ #LGBTQIA #Entertainment #Movies #Inclusion #Representation #Culture

https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/12/10/glinda-elphaba-lesbian-wicked-book/

I'm terrible at understanding hidden meanings (#subtext) in #movies and other #art, so I was really bothered by #BladeRunner when #Deckard was able to hang on by one hand with broken fingers.

It wasn't until a few years after the #web was created that I found that many people had realized Deckard was a #replicant. Then that scene finally made sense to me.

That kind of impossible human feat is (still) so common in movies, I assumed it was lazy, bad #writing and #directing, and not a clue.

In my subtext class, we talk about inflection--how meaning changes based on _how_ words are said. This seems pretty obvious & I think about how we do it in real life & how actors do it. But then there's a moment of--wait!--how do we make inflection felt in writing?

So: Just describing it, of course. Emphasis through rhythm & punctuation choices. Gesture. What else?

How do you play with inflection in your dialogue?

This time I wrote about Megan Gidding's The Women Could Fly and a moment that is small but truly thrilling. It's about subtext and landscape and a weirding of the way energy flows within a passage.

Also, the book is magnificent.

https://bit.ly/WomenFlyLandscapeReflect

I think a lot about how subtext is a double-edged sword.

It asks the reader to invest more fully in the story and when the reader is able to do so, it creates an incredibly rich experience. A relationship between reader and story forms. It's more alive and more immersive.

But subtext is also exclusionary to any reader who doesn't have the particular cultural experience that the subtext relies on.