Showing Versus Telling

Showing versus telling is a huge discussion topic in the writing craft community.

And rightfully so. It is an integral part of getting your book to connect with your readers, getting them to feel what you want them to feel, and understand what you need them to understand. 

And it is something that authors struggle with no matter where they are at in their career – new or 50 books in.

So let’s talk about what those terms mean, as well as how to show AND how to tell – because both are vital to the balance of a story – and go through some examples to demonstrate the difference, so when you get the inevitable “show don’t tell!” feedback in your edit, you’ll know exactly what to do next. To view the video, head HERE.

Okay, so what do people mean when they say “show versus tell” or “show don’t tell”?

This is a tricky writing technique where you evaluate the information you’re giving the reader in a scene and balance how you write it by sometimes showing information— painting the picture, giving lots of detail, setting the scene, showing the reader what is going on— versus sometimes telling information—just stating the facts.

A common misconception is that “telling” is bad. But it isn’t. It is just easier to do, so most of the editorial feedback out there is generally changing telling to showing (show don’t tell), which is where that confusion probably came from. 

Don’t be swayed by that -- both are needed in a story to give the full picture to the reader.

So when do you want to “show” details? As I mentioned above, showing gives more information, it sets the scene for the readers. Imagine it as seeing something in 4k versus regular HD. As a reader, you feel like you are there, like you are experiencing it —it is personal and intimate.

You want to do this – to “show” – on the vital details in your story. Give more on what is important, what you need the readers to experience and to pay attention to.

I know what you’re thinking, everything in my story is important or it wouldn’t be in my story. So why would I tell when I can show everything, make everything 4k?!

And there are two reasons: first, there is a hierarchy of information you are giving your reader, some details are more important than others, which I’ll dive into in a minute with my examples.

But second, and more importantly, readers only have so much attention to give. There is a limited amount to what a reader, who might only read your book once, is going to catch and remember and it is your job as the author to emphasize what they should be connecting to – building them a map to lead them through the massive maze that is your complex story.

 If you don’t, they might get lost in the details, or focus on the wrong thing, and miss something important. Or get so overwhelmed they put the book down (a common issue with why people never made it through the Lord of the Rings series – not bashing Tolkien, just stating a fact).

By telling the smaller, less important details, you can quickly convey what the reader needs to know at that moment and get them more quickly to the vital parts of the scene or story. 

So with all that said, let’s go over some examples to show you want I mean (no pun intended):

Let’s say you are writing a contemporary story, and your characters enter a neighborhood. 

Ask yourself, how important is the neighborhood? That will tell you whether you should show or tell.

If the neighborhood is just passing scenery, a happenstance of where they are, just state that detail and keep moving to the more important part.

So something like, “As they entered the neighborhood, Sarah could feel her heart start to pound. She didn’t want to see Gabe again. After what he’d done, she didn’t know if she’d ever be able to face him. Pulling into the drive, Sarah’s mom turned off the car and turned to her….”

Etc, etc… So in that instance, the neighborhood was not important, it was just a small detail you could just tell the reader. We didn’t need to know what the houses looked like, how big the neighborhood was, how long it took to get to Gabe’s house. The important part here was showing how Sarah was feeling, building the dread before they got to Gabe’s house.

So now, let’s flip it. Let’s say the neighborhood is important. What does that look like?

“As they entered the neighborhood, Sarah could feel her heart start to pound. There were so many houses crammed together, one after the other. But there wasn’t a single soul in sight. Doors had been left hanging open, bikes and toys lay abandoned in the grass, as though their owners would be right back.  But Sarah knew there was no coming back for them. For anyone.”

So in that scene, the neighborhood was important. Showing it gave more information about the world and had an effect on Sarah as they drove through (or probably walked through, if the world had ended). So showing those details, spending that time there, was important. And now that you’ve shown that, you could state that they walked for miles, and then jump to when they are inevitably attacked by zombies, diving back into showing that action. 

Hopefully these examples give you a good idea of what it means to show, what it means to tell, and the balance that needs to happen between the two. Why both are important. 

The trick is not showing over telling or telling over showing, but jumping between the two to carefully weave your story—have an ebb and flow—keeping the tension and pacing high, and keeping your reader interested and invested. 

Now, as you practice showing and telling more and get the hang of the balance and feel that works for your voice, you won’t need to do such a clinical evaluation every time. It is a sense that you’ll get for your writing that will get better and better the more you do it.

BUT the reason everyone—and I do mean everyone—struggles with this at some point in their writing career is because every book and every scene is different. And if you are having a hard time writing a particular story arc, character, scene etc… you might rely too heavily on showing or telling. And it will throw off the balance of the scene, or the feel of the character. 

And as the author, you are probably too close to the story to see it because you already know what you are supposed to know there, the feeling you want to come across because you wrote it. So that is where an editor (or beta readers, critique partners, etc…) come in, to help you identify when the balance is off.

Hopefully this has been helpful! And you’ll now know what it means when someone comes back to you with the feedback “show don’t tell here!” And know how to go about fixing it. 

I could talk for days about this because it is such a complicated, but fascinating writing technique. If you’d like to see more examples, I’m considering doing a part two, just to give you a bit more to work with as you start to figure this out for your own writing. If you think that would be useful, let me know in the comments.

And until next week, keep writing!