Even the Kids Call it "Show AND Tell"

One writer's feelings on "show not tell".

Photo by Fiona Murray-deGraaff on Unsplash and edited by me

Currently Reading: Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

Showing and telling might seem like they’re at war with each other, but they’re really not. They’re just tools. One is not really all that much better than the other. It’s all about context, which I know is super annoying but it’s true. Most writing advice is like that, honestly. 

I’m going to try and break down what each of them mean, when they’re the most useful, and some tips that help break down some of the barriers around the two concepts.

Definitions and explanations 

To tell means to explain something or to represent something in words. In a writing context, it looks a lot like stating, using direct language to say what happened without describing it too much. I’m going to make a separate post about the passive voice at some point, but that tends to be the most common reason people warn against telling; it can be very passive. 

Some examples of telling:

The young child was sad.

There is a zebra eating in the grass.

The woman is really pretty and nice.

Meanwhile, to show is to visualize or describe something. Showing uses a lot of description and metaphors to paint a picture in the reader’s head of something very specific. The reason most writing teachers will tell you to show instead of tell is because it creates that specificity, and tends to lead to more vivid writing. 

Some examples of showing:

The little boy cried with his head between his knees. 

A zebra chews brown grass, tail flicking.

The woman’s smile shines bright, and she thanks everyone around her over and over. 

Uses

Telling is used most in texts that aim to educate or explain something. Textbooks, social posts, news reports, and a lot of nonfiction use telling to make something simple very clear. 

However, it can also be used in creative writing when something just doesn’t need all those extra words. It’s okay to tell sometimes! Don’t let anyone scare you out of using your real voice in your stories. Sometimes a character just needs to do something without it being visual. That’s fine! 

Telling is good for actions and feelings that most people know well enough to not need a long, detailed description. You might not need to go into vivid detail about what milk looks and tastes like. A character can just drink it. Every piece of writing advice has its limits. Bend them. 

Showing is more common in creative writing than in any sort of technical writing. The place where you’ll probably see only showing is in poetry; poets tend to be more visual and descriptive. This is, of course, not always the case, but it’s the most common example. 

Showing is useful because it allows you to create a picture on the page that more closely matches the one in your head. Something I have to explain to students all the time is that your imagination is not the same as anyone else’s; your readers may not see the same picture in their brain as you see in yours, and that’s fine! The idea behind showing is to make that picture as accurate as possible.

Here’s the thing: to say that one is better than the other is a falsehood. Showing is more specific, which tends to help out in fiction and in creative writing in general, but telling is not the enemy. 

Good practice is to try taking a line that tells and making it show. It will either read better or it will feel like pretention. 

Here’s my try: 

Telling: The castle was big, and Serah was afraid to enter it alone. 

Showing: The castle loomed near the clouds, and Serah trembled, wringing her hands, looking around to see if anyone could go in with her.

Something you might notice is that showing tends to be wordier. That’s part of why it has a time and place; not everything needs to be full of description. Sometimes a castle is just big. But it helps to show how a character feels, because it tells you something about how they are as a person. 

Barriers

Showing is harder than telling because it takes a wider vocabulary and an understanding of how grammar can turn one into the other. Shifting the “is” or “was” in a sentence can turn something from a tell into a show. 

Vocabulary is one barrier. One tip to overcome that is to read plenty and let yourself absorb new words. Look up what you don’t know. 

The main barrier is not knowing the difference. Being able to decipher what is a tell and what is a show is a learned skill and takes time. 

Here are some ways to know:

Passive voice: Check your “is”s and “was”s. 

Visuals: Are you describing something visual or are you just saying what something is?

Other senses: Sensory details or vague descriptors?

Narration vs Dialogue: Dialogue is always a show, even if the words are tells. Narration is where you’ll want to know the difference.

Feel free to practice this over and over and over again. Use your tools when necessary, don’t take any advice as gospel, and write what makes sense to you. 

Keep on writin’ on.

-Rachel, a writer tired of the same strict advice over and over