Show, Don’t Tell in Writing: What It Really Means

“Show, don’t tell.”

Probably the most ubiquitous writing advice you will ever run into. Writing advice is very subjective, but this tends to be the one that most people agree on. While it’s popular advice, it’s very difficult for aspiring writers to actually apply it because…it’s kind of vague. It’s only three words, and there is so much nuance in this writing tip that tends to get lost.

Would it surprise you to hear there are times when telling (not showing) is actually more appropriate? It depends on the context, which I believe you can boil down to three different levels: the plot level, the scene level, and the sentence level.

Show, Don’t Tell: The Plot Level

When you outline a novel, you are deciding what scenes will go in the novel. You’re also deciding which ones won’t. Sometimes the stuff that’s cut aren’t worth mentioning, but many times it’s stuff that happens “off screen.”

The most common example is a character’s past. Unless you use flashbacks, you’re not going to write scenes about their rough childhood or when they lost their job. Instead, the character tells the reader about it. Either in interior narrative or through dialogue with another character.

Another example might be your antagonist’s story. You might decide not to show their point of view, in which case, the reader will have to be told what they’ve been up to this whole time. The cliche version of this is the “villain monologue,” but it can also be revealed by other characters or through the discovery of vital information. Either way, we’re not seeing the action of the antagonist play out on screen.

These are instances where telling can really shine. By not showing your hand, you create mystery and suspense.

So when planning out your novel, think about what events you will actually show and which ones you’ll tell. When it comes to those you tell, consider how readers will be told. These decisions can really help your plot come together.

Show, Don’t Tell: The Scene Level

The scene level addresses parts of the scene that you write out vs. ones you summarize.

Imagine a scene where a character calls another character on the phone. Instead of showing the character picking up their phone, hitting the ‘accept’ button, and saying, “Hello,” we instead keep it simple and just tell the reader directly: When she got off the bus, Amber called. She wanted to talk about the argument they’d had earlier. “I’m sorry I got upset, but you refuse to see my side of it,” Amber said.

It’s common for newer writers to assume that every action needs to be written out, almost like stage directions in a play. But you need to be economic with what you write, and wasting precious words on sentences that a reader will assume is happening does you no favors. If a character calls, is it not obvious that they will have to hit the ‘accept’ button to answer? Does it matter whether or not the character says “hello?” The reader cares more about the reason for the call, not how the call was answered.

This is by no means of a catch-all concept either. There may be instances where the details are a little more important. For example, if other characters need to overhear the phone call, it’ll be important to specify that our protagonist put the call on speaker when they answered. But those are the types of details you need to consider when deciding what parts of the scene you show and which ones you just tell the reader.

Show, Don’t Tell: The Sentence Level

And finally, we get to the sentence level. This is the one that gets talked about the most in writing circles, and it mainly impacts your word choice and sentence construction.

If a character is feeling an emotion, we don’t tell readers “she was mad” or “he was excited.” We show it through their hand gestures, facial expressions, the words they say, the volume of their voice.

This can also be extended to adjective and adverb use:

If a character is “running quickly”, we might instead say they dashed, raced, sprinted, etc.

If a character picks up a “weird object,” we might instead describe why it’s weird. Even if you do describe it a couple of sentences later, it’s tempting to start by telling the reader, “She saw a weird object on the ground.” You don’t need that. Just skip to the actual description of the item.

Is “Show, Don’t Tell” Always True?

Nothing in writing is absolute. Writing advice is almost always dependent on the context, the writer, and the eventual reader.

“Show, don’t tell” became popular because it’s short and snappy, but you can’t take it at face value. Sometimes it’s better to show, and sometimes it’s better to tell.

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