59: How to Use Body Language to Improve Storytelling

Recently I watched a fascinating video on YouTube on the wired

channel that featured Joe Navarro, a former FBI agent who

specialized in interrogation and reading body language. I will

link to that video in the show notes he concentrated on the

face in his video, and I was amazed by all the clues we can

gather by watching people's faces. If we know what to look

for. In fact, humans are wired from birth to concentrate on

nonverbal cues we receive by observing facial expressions.

This video got me thinking about body language and nonverbal

communication, and how vital it is to good storytelling. Today

we will cover using body language to improve your writing

by conveying emotion showing instead of telling, boosting

characterization and so much more. Hey, writing for suits

authors, welcome back the show. To those of you who are new, I

want to extend a special welcome. My name is Kathrese

McKee. And I'm glad you're here. Reasons to use body language one

convey emotion and meaning using nonverbal cues such as facial

expression, eye contact posture, voice, body movement, touch,

proximity, emotional awareness and attentiveness at the kids

soccer match is mom shaking her eyes, leaning forward in her

chair and calling out encouragement, or his mom

standing at a distance, texting on her phone and deaf to the

shout so the other parents to show instead of tell notice in

the previous example of the mom at the soccer game, I did not

say the woman didn't care about her child's feelings, but you

might gather as much in context. Her inattention could mean she's

consumed about worry about something. I showed her actions,

but I didn't tell you what they meant. Three, reduce the need

for speech tags, which get repetitive during dialogue. Use

beats instead. Speech tags are not bad. But sometimes we get

lazy when we write and miss the opportunity to do more because

it's easier to rely on speech tags and to use meaningful

beats. Let's look at an example passage. Way to go Bobby. Derek

yelled and jostled Mandy's arm, and the sounds of jubilation in

the bleachers yanked her to the present to the hot summer

morning in the high school stadium. Away from the

shattering text message on her screen. She punched the off

button on the phone and shoved it in her back pocket. What

happened? Bobby scored a goal. Didn't you see it? He scored?

Yeah. She bit her lip and glanced toward the field. I

can't believe I missed it. Derek bend down to get a better look

at her face. Is something wrong? Oh, she hesitated. Well, my boss

sent me a text on a Saturday. Yeah, um, her throat burned and

she forced herself to lie. Becky had to go home and I need to

fill in now today. Yes, he had the kindest brown eyes. Why did

it have to be this way? Um, could you she rested resisted

the urge to fidget. I mean, would you be willing to watch

Bobby for a few hours? Derek studied her for a long lemon

before he nodded. Of course I can. Mark would enjoy having

Bobby over. Relief washed over her. Well, thank you so much.

I'll pick up some pizza for all of us when I get off. Would that

be okay? Sure. He leaned back with a crooked smile. Hey, I

never turned down free food. You're a lifesaver. No problem.

I gotta let Bobby's coach know before I leave. Mandy crammed

her water bottle and her hat into her game day bag extracted

her chunky keychain and grasped the new pepper spray canister

like a talisman. With fresh courage. She descended the

bleacher steps on shaky legs. There are no speech tags in this

scene fragment but there's plenty of subtext for Relay

sensory information he called numbness, softness, hardness

five, boost characterization. What does each character feel

notice? Or think about? These things show what sort of person

they are? How do they betray their thoughts through body

language? How do they try to hide or mask their emotional

reactions through deceptive body language? Six, communicate

subtext. If your protagonist is socially awkward, or somehow

unaware of clues from other characters. They may see the

other characters body language and not fully understand, but

your readers will get it. This is a great way to increase the

tension of a passage. Indeed, the readers may be shouting

warnings from the sidelines for example, let's say that this is

a romantic thriller and Derek is the love interest. If the reader

knows Mandy is doing something stupid, and dangerous. They may

be rooting for Derek to stop her. He almost

catches on that something isn't right. But he doesn't know Mandy

well enough yet to question what she's up to. So he lets her go

off to face danger alone. tips for using body language in

dialogue one, don't overdo it. If you describe every little

action, your prose will get out of hand to use strong verbs. If

you notice lots of Li adverbs in your prose, it's time to stretch

for better verbs. Let's look back at our passage the verbs

were yelled jostled, yank, punched, shoved, bit, glanced,

bent, burned, forced, resisted, studied, nodded, washed, leaned

crammed, extracted graphs and descended. Most verbs in the

passage indicated action and exact meaning without the need

for helping words. Three, watch out for repetitive patterns like

beat line, beat line, beat line, or line beat line, beat, line

beat, mix things up. It's easy to fall into a passage,

especially with dialogue. So look for this type of thing.

When you're self editing. For example, Derrick turned toward

her. Bobby scored a goal. Didn't you see it? She stared at him

blankly. He scored, he gave her an incredulous stare. Yeah, she

bit her lip and glance toward the field. I can't believe I

missed I missed it. Derek bend down to get a better look at her

face. Is something wrong? She hesitated. Oh, well, my boss

sent me a text. Did you see the pattern? Did you hear it? Beat

line beat line beat line and entire page of this gets old

fast. Also, the lines make the beats unnecessary. You don't

need to say that Derek turned to war her because it's implied by

his line. Bobby scored a goal. Did you see it? You don't need

to say that Mandy stared at him incredulously because you see it

in your head based on her line. He scored. Your reader is smart

enough to fill in the blanks for playing unadorned lines are

okay, as long as it's clear who is speaking and as long as the

word choices seem authentic to each character. If you had only

the lines to go on, would you know who was speaking? Can we

remove the Beats from the passage and know who's speaking?

Way to go, Bobby? What happened? Bobby scored a goal. Didn't you

see it? He scored? Yeah. I can't believe I missed it. Is

something wrong? Oh, well, my boss sent me a text on a

Saturday. Yeah, I'm Becky had to go home and I need to fill in.

Now today. Yes. Could you I mean, would you be willing to

watch Bobby for a few hours? Of course I can. Mark would love to

have Bobby over. Thank you so much. I'll pick up some pizza

for all of us when I get off. Would that be okay? Sure. Hey, I

never turned down free food. You're a lifesaver. Oh, no

problem. I gotta let Bobby's coach know before I leave.

Without the pros. We don't know who's talking at first, and we

don't know where they are. We can tell one of the speakers was

distracted enough to miss Bobby's goal. That character

uses up a lot and needs to leave. The other character is

thoughtful and accommodating. By the time you get to the end of

the dialogue. You're pretty sure they have boys, Bobby and Mark

who are playing in a soccer game. And we know it's Saturday.

The beats help give context and subtext and most of the beats

are nonverbal communication. Five, double check your dialogue

for clarity. Be sure the reader knows who's speaking. If the

speaker is unclear add tags or physical action to help the

reader understand without having to read the lines again, six

keep beats with lines usually, a character's beats should be in

the same paragraph with their lines not always. But usually,

of course, beats often happen on their own.

If you are finding value in this video, take a moment right now

to smash the like button to help others find this information.

Thanks so much. There are three pitfalls of using body language

in fiction floating body parts. For the most part, make sure

characters are in control. For example, Her hand flew her

mouth, oh Maya flying hand. Instead, Mandy covered her mouth

with her hand. Her feet shuffled through the leaves. Instead, she

shuffled through the leaves to weird, awkward gross word

pictures. For example, His eyes devoured her face. I know I've

read this in the sentence in real life. The author was trying

to be romantic, but it's gross and unintentionally funny. Three

cliche overused phrases she rolled her eyes. Yes, it's

cliche, but rolling eyes are part of the lexicon. Sometimes

there isn't a better way. I would advise you to be aware and

try to find other ways to communicate the same emotion.

Don't obsess about floating body parts and cliche phrases, but

try to minimize them. This has worked for the revision phase.

Feel free to use shorthand and tried expressions during your

first draft.

So, I don't want to leave you without sharing a couple of

resources. First consider purchasing Joe Navarro his book,

The dictionary of body language, a field guide to human behavior.

I think so highly of this book that I have included it on the

resources page, on writing pursuits.com and in the show

notes. Secondly, I highly recommend purchasing the emotion

thesaurus, a writers guide to character expression by Becky

Puglisi and Angela Ackerman. I love the way they name and

emotion and spell out dozens of physical tales that go with it.

This book is also on the resources page on writing for

suits.com. Today we have talked about body language to convey

emotion and meaning using nonverbal clues to show instead

of tail to reduce the need for speech tags and dialogue to

relay sensory information to boost characterization, and to

communicate subtext and build tension. The question of the

week is, what are some overused phrases you try to avoid in your

fiction writing?

Leave your answers at writing pursuits.com forward slash

podcast forward slash 59. That's all I have for today. Until next

time, keep writing my friends, keep writing. Leave your

comments and questions below. Thanks for watching today. If

you enjoyed this episode, or learn something you can use,

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