Female dialog by male writers.

[The Tourist]

I can describe a fifty year old panhead Harley down to its lock-washers. I can assemble most guns in the dark. You don't touch any of my knives' edges without a warning, a few pints of blood and a tourniquet. I can even fold laundry with corners so square that the sock drawer listens to Barry Manilow music.

But I cannot write female dialog.

It is so bad that I have sought out a collaborator in Canada to help me write better dialog. She guides me through actual wording, or I use a rejoinder like, "This is where Daphne West insults Cutter's crappy blue jeans." She just fills it in.

Even my wife gets into the fray. She once shook her head and stated, "For a guy who has 'dated' as many women as you have, you sure don't understand us."

Well, I proved her correct. I immediately responded, "Heck, who listens..?"

Look at the Star Wars movies. I'm surprised that the female actors can say their lines without puking.

So, two things. Are there any other guys out here with the same problem?

And two, I'm reading "Angelology" which is written by a female. The men in the book describe things with "their feelings" and discuss hair and clothes way too much.

...you should see how I dress. And feelings? Right now I feel like another cup of coffee. Does that count...

[joshuachrisstoff]

I am a bloke. I write military spec ops. The team #2 is female and very much so but she is a team member first. Without getting into specifics, she is fully subservient to the MC. There is some field discretion for her as a female but when it comes to a skinny dip in a hot or cold climate, it is one in, all in. Clearly on long and arduous deploys body health checks are critical, tropical, or ice and frost bite checks mean that each team member inspects each other without issue. Hell, when you rely on a person for your very life all day and night, a health check is what we all need.

I have had one other strong female but as she is senior FBI, I kind of simply treated her as a guy too. I mean she is professional and that covers the girlie bits and the bloke/testosterone BS as well. All my approach is professionals operating at the highest level where personality and flare are squashed out.

So I don't do any girlie bits but I can see what you are asking. I thort on this for some hours and I don't believe I have the insight to 'write' from a woman's POV.
I believe that is a skill I do not possess. Of course at 50 and still single probably means I don't understand them, or perhaps I do and am too smart to get caught!

[jackharper]

I have written from male POV and I am female. At first I found it a bit challenging. But honestly, it is like making any other character. When you write a character you have to literally see and feel the way they do. You have to think about how they would respond, not how you would, and after a while, the sex of the character stops mattering if you know them well enough.

That's how I see it anyway.

Jack

[The Tourist]

The issue I keep stumbling over is subtext. After all, two people can view the same set of circumstances and walk away with differing opinions. This happens to my wife and I almost daily.

Then there's the issue of socialization. What I view as logical is often an opinion at odds with the entire room, even men. When I am in a room with peers, I find we are sometimes at odds with our entire city.

One strategy I use is snippets of real conversation I've heard from those who differ, even the idiots. After all, a book is a spectrum of characters.

But at the end of the day I tend to gravitate towards strong women. And while they make interesting characters to follow in a story, you cannot have a book comprised of dangerous bikers and women from prison.

...or can you...?

[bpublisher]

Jan 27, 2013 9:13:28 GMT -5 The Tourist said:

The issue I keep stumbling over is subtext. After all, two people can view the same set of circumstances and walk away with differing opinions. This happens to my wife and I almost daily.

Then there's the issue of socialization. What I view as logical is often an opinion at odds with the entire room, even men. When I am in a room with peers, I find we are sometimes at odds with our entire city.

One strategy I use is snippets of real conversation I've heard from those who differ, even the idiots. After all, a book is a spectrum of characters.

But at the end of the day I tend to gravitate towards strong women. And while they make interesting characters to follow in a story, you cannot have a book comprised of dangerous bikers and women from prison.

...or can you...?

Most bikers are not dangerous, and most women have never been in prison. Perhaps it would help your writing by changing the type people in your circle.

[Lily]

Jan 27, 2013 5:44:09 GMT -5 joshuachrisstoff said:

I am a bloke. I write military spec ops. The team #2 is female and very much so but she is a team member first. Without getting into specifics, she is fully subservient to the MC. There is some field discretion for her as a female but when it comes to a skinny dip in a hot or cold climate, it is one in, all in. Clearly on long and arduous deploys body health checks are critical, tropical, or ice and frost bite checks mean that each team member inspects each other without issue. Hell, when you rely on a person for your very life all day and night, a health check is what we all need.

I have had one other strong female but as she is senior FBI, I kind of simply treated her as a guy too. I mean she is professional and that covers the girlie bits and the bloke/testosterone BS as well. All my approach is professionals operating at the highest level where personality and flare are squashed out.

So I don't do any girlie bits but I can see what you are asking. I thort on this for some hours and I don't believe I have the insight to 'write' from a woman's POV.
I believe that is a skill I do not possess. Of course at 50 and still single probably means I don't understand them, or perhaps I do and am too smart to get caught!

Good to see you again, Joshua, it's been a while. Hope your book is selling well.

[jackharper]

Jan 27, 2013 9:13:28 GMT -5 The Tourist said:

The issue I keep stumbling over is subtext. After all, two people can view the same set of circumstances and walk away with differing opinions. This happens to my wife and I almost daily.

Then there's the issue of socialization. What I view as logical is often an opinion at odds with the entire room, even men. When I am in a room with peers, I find we are sometimes at odds with our entire city.

No offense, and I'm really not trying to be wise or anything, but in your above explanation you still refer to situations that YOU are in, you refer to circumstances that YOU have formed opinions on or YOUR wife, who I assume you know well. You refer to YOU in a social situation and YOU being at odds with peers.

I think that if you are writing a character it has to completely be about them. Sure, you can relate to life experiences, but you have to think, how would my character react? What subtext is this character going to take away? How is this character in a social situation? How can this character get the point across she or he is trying to? In that regard, sex and gender shouldn't be a big issue.

I don't know if I explained that well, but I find that if I detach completely from myself and only write with the character's reactions, thoughts, feelings, and opinions in mind, my own personal thoughts don't get in the way.

[The Tourist]

No, you explained it perfectly. And you would be right in most cases of fiction. The issue here is that my MC is 75% me.

Without giving out the plot, the story deals with a spiritual walk, my walk. the characters I have chosen are amalgamations of people I really know.

The MC and his best friend are actually sides of me. The lead as myself when younger, his friend would hold my views as an older man.

The Queen is an old girl friend.

I know what I would say, and in many cases I know what the characters say, because their human counterparts have already said it. But it is, on the whole, a book of fiction, and I'd like the characters to be fully formed, and not use stilted language.

[jackharper]

I see. In that case I would write the dialogue that has already been said out so you can see it. Read the subtext of the conversations that have happened, study how they spoke in the conversations that have already happened. Modifying those conversations into more fictionalized dialogue might be easier if you can gauge what subtext is being conveyed originally, and then tweaking it slightly.

I don't know if that is something you've tried, but that is what I would do, if I was really trying to get the same idea across with different dialogue.

[joshuachrisstoff]

Hack, first post is right.
Second is wrong
Third is right again.

I am a bloke. I am single with no known children, see, a bloke would say that but a man may not, a lady wouldn't and a slag may.

Since I have very limited female experience, and certainly not seeing the differences between male and female children of mine that live with me every day, I feel unable to write and think like a female.

I do see them act, react, feel and behave, in real life, a lot different to males but to actually reproduce that in context in a book of fiction, I don't feel at all capable of doing it.

As I indicated my #2 MC is a female but within the military, and spec ops, I handle all characters usually with the highest and professional skills. I may form a new type character as only half baked, lacking in skills, style and panache perhaps but I really don't know what a lady/woman would or even may say.
I hear The Tourist saying that he finds that recording and regurgitating real life interactions a real and realistic way to portray the different, female perspective.
Without being supercritical to him, I don't see that as truly original fiction writing. Hey I can't do the real thing either, that is why I focus heavily more on the sort of 'technical' side of the story rather than fully exploring any of the females in great depth. I must confess that I have got indepth with a lot more than the MC. Perhaps I wouldn't have known that without this specific thread.
It is not a failure that I had picked up yet.

I am not a misogynist by any stretch of anyone's imagination. I do like women as a concept and individually. I have even formed semi stable relationships with the odd one <GRIN>. They have lasted for 2 or 3 or even 4 months at occasional times. Perhaps a poor choice of words there. I wish the twink worked on more than just the screen. Duh!

Summation. I know females are different. How they are different or how they originally think, I have no idea!

Did you hear about "Little Johnny"?
He came home from little school one day and announced to his mother that there were two kind of peoples. Males and Airmales. It is probably better done in voice!?

[marcel]

Lotta good points here.