Lately I've come to notice a lot of established and respected authors using the word "said" in different ways in dialog. Mostly, I've come to notice that when the word is used with a real character name, like Tom, it'll be used as follows:
"I like that," said Tom.
But when used with pronouns, it is reversed, as in:
"I like that," he said.
Things may have changed since I was taught my basic English, but I was taught to use "said" last in both the above examples. So is this a style issue, or is there some rule that has been taught more recently that says that the above is more correct or proper, or is it just that it sounds better to most people? I know either is correct English, but what do most of you do when you use "said"? Maybe you can enlighten me on this.
Posted by steffenwolf (Member # 8250) on :
To me, "said Tom" sounds a little-bit old fashioned, a step up from "spaketh". It feels like it gives more weight to Tom's importance, like he is an important person who ought to be listened to. I'm not really sure why I get that impression. It could just be me.
I tend to take a lot of advice from "Self-editing for Fiction Writers". In that book they suggest you should always do "____ said", regardless of who it's referencing.
Posted by steffenwolf (Member # 8250) on :
And for some reason, the order seems much more reversible if it's a name than a pronoun.
Tom said vs. said Tom they're both readable to me, though they have a slightly different tone to me.
he said vs. said he if I saw "said he" in a story, I think that would be a real stumbling block.
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
Early on in my literary career, I got to feeling that "said Tom" backwards writing looked like, so I went over to "Tom said" and have stuck with it ever since. But I've often wondered about it...
...or at least I did until, oh, year before last. I read a set of books by a pair of collaborating writers who, well, are well known but not exactly top of the heap in SF, though I heard their stuff sold fairly well. I happened to notice they used the form "Tom said" rather than "said Tom." Seeing somebody do what I've been doing all along enhartened me no end.
Posted by Spaceman (Member # 9240) on :
Personally, I try to avoid using the word 'said' and tag by context instead.
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
I should add to this a pernicious Barry B. Longyear influence, where he advocated (and practices) omitting any "he said" or variations thereof. This is much too pure a way to invalidate a perfectly acceptable pair of words for my tastes, though I occasionally keep it in mind while writing...
Posted by skadder (Member # 6757) on :
Yeah, keep tags for when you need them only. Otherwise use context and action tags.
Posted by luapc (Member # 2878) on :
Avoiding them whenever possible is the best policy, but sometimes you just can't, and in those cases, "said" is the one to use the most. For example, when there are three or more people in a scene, tags need to be used so the reader knows who's talking.
Another way to do it without a tag, besides letting the dialog itself do the work, is to use separate sentences that make it clear, but too much of that can be bad, too. The best paced dialog seems to use a combination of everything without overuse. Good dialog is a skill worth learning to do well, in my opinion.
Posted by JenniferHicks (Member # 8201) on :
"Tom said" is almost invisible, something the reader skims over except for clarification on who's talking. "said Tom" draws attention to itself because it's out of the norm. If I were to use the latter, I would need a good reason for it.
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
I'd say "said Tom" was the normal form...I, personally, stopped writing it that way because I thought it looked backwards to me...but I didn't promote my cause and almost everybody else writes "said Tom" to this day...
Posted by LintonRobinson (Member # 8325) on :
"Reverse order natural is not," said Yoda.
Posted by EricJamesStone (Member # 1681) on :
In general, with proper names I put said next to the dialogue: "To be or not to be," said Harry. Harry said, "To be or not to be."
I sometimes will make this switch for a bit of variety: "To be or not to be," Harry said.
But I never make this one: Said Harry, "To be or not to be."
With pronouns, I always put the pronoun before said:
"To be or not to be," he said. He said, "To be or not to be."