LESSON Empower your dialogue with context to take it to the next level

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The lesson this time is a passage from Great Expectations (spoilers below).

Pip saves the convict Magwitch, who is exiled to New South Wales and raises a fortune, which he passes on to Pip to repay his kindness. Magwitch visits Pip in England in violation of his exile; Pip is horrified to learn that his "great expectations" are fueled by a convict. While he slowly comes around, terrible events befall Magwitch and he is now on his deathbed.

"Are you in much pain to-day?"

"I don't complain of none, dear boy."

"You never do complain."

He had spoken his last words. He smiled, and I understood his touch to mean that he wished to lift my hand, and lay it on his breast. I laid it there, and he smiled again, and put both his hands upon it.

We can feel that Pip is speaking softly with sympathy, kindness, sadness, appreciation, and love that he found too late to share. We feel Magwitch's love for Pip. We know that they both know the end is near. All these feelings are conveyed with dialogue expertly set within the context of the scene, that we know Magwitch is dying. There is no need to describe how either character feels, nor any need to describe the inflections and nuances of their voice. We mouth their words to ourselves, as if we were there talking to Magwitch.

The allotted time ran out, while we were thus; but, looking round, I found the governor of the prison standing near me, and he whispered, "You needn't go yet." I thanked him gratefully, and asked, "Might I speak to him, if he can hear me?"

The governor stepped aside, and beckoned the officer away. The change, though it was made without noise, drew back the film from the placid look at the white ceiling, and he looked most affectionately at me.

"Dear Magwitch, I must tell you, now at last. You understand what I say?"

A gentle pressure on my hand.

"You had a child once, whom you loved and lost."

A stronger pressure on my hand.

"She lived and found powerful friends. She is living now. She is a lady and very beautiful. And I love her!"

With a last faint effort, which would have been powerless but for my yielding to it and assisting it, he raised my hand to his lips. Then, he gently let it sink upon his breast again, with his own hands lying on it. The placid look at the white ceiling came back, and passed away, and his head dropped quietly on his breast.

There is not one adverb enhanced "said", nor are there are not any flowery adjectives. The narrative heft is all within actions ("a stronger pressure"), peripheral to the emotions we are meant to experience, yet completely sufficient to trigger our empathy. We keenly feel the incredible rollercoaster of emotions that Magwitch must be going through, to learn that his lost daughter is not only alive, but that the one boy who showed him kindness so many years ago when he was a convict on the run, is in love with his daughter and swears to pursue and make her happy. What an overwhelming sense of shock, relief, love, awe, and respect that Magwitch must feel in the last few seconds before his soul slips away!

Finally,

Mindful, then, of what we had read together, I thought of the two men who went up into the Temple to pray, and I knew there were no better words that I could say beside his bed, than "O Lord, be merciful to him, a sinner!"

One of my favourite lines of all time. Everyone has sincerely wished for something from the bottom of their heart, if only once. We can tell that Pip feels the same, fervently wishing with all his might that if Lord does exist, that he can weigh the sum of Magwitch's life and find it in his unlimited love to give Magwitch the salvation he deserves. All this, done only with the humble exclamation mark and the appropriate context.

Wrap your dialogue with context and you shan't need the fine toothed comb of adverbs or adjectives.