Are you for or against the use of the word "said"?

What Just Like That said.

I think you'll find that the majority of modern writers whom critics praise as good writers, as opposed to hacks who write mainly for money, use "said" for the majority of their dialogue tags. They use "said" because it's invisible. It lets the dialogue - and hence the characters - speak for itself. "Unusual" tags like "grumbled" or "asseverated" draw attention away from the dialogue.

If you feel the need to tell the reader how a character said something, it's a sign that your dialogue - and possibly the rest of your writing - is weak. You can get away with the occasional "yelled" or "whispered" or "muttered" when it mightn't be obvious, or it might be plausible for the character to say something at normal volume.

Fashions change - in a lot of older novels that are now considered classics, you'll find a lot more fancy synonyms for "said", and a lot more flowery writing generally. Until the 20th century, it was considered much more acceptable for the author to talk directly to the reader, explaining what was going on and what you were supposed to think of the characters. Nowadays, the author is supposed to fade into the background and let the characters tell the story, as much as possible. That means you probably shouldn't use flowery language unless it comes directly from the mouth of a character.

I'm for it. It's a common enough word that blends well into the background of the story, so that a reader may focus more on the dialogue and happenings, than on the writing, itself. After reading Narnia, I've discovered how much I hate being reminded that I'm reading something that someone else wrote; it pulls me out of my own imagination and roughens up the whole thing, if you know what I mean. I don't want to pay attention to the writing. I want the story to sit on top of the writing, and not the other way around. If the writing becomes too seemingly contrived, instead of more natural, then it pulls me out of the book. An occassional divergence from "said," when it's appropriate, is absolutely fine. But when "said" doesn't seem to exist at all and the book is full of "sighs," "mutters," "laughs," and "jokes," it's just obnoxious. If a writer hardly uses "said" then they're trying too hard.

I don't mind "said."

I read a book on writing once, and it said that "said" is like an invisible word. If you stick it in, no one will really notice. I mean, I guess you're noticing it, and I notice it sometimes. But for the most part it keeps the story going without taking too much out of it.

I don't think a writer that doesn't use "said" at all is a good writer. I think they just know how to use a thesaurus. Using "said" doesn't mean you're lazy. If you use it all the time, maybe. But if it works, then the writer probably knew when he was writing it that "said" would work better. Maybe he experimented with "laughed" and "cried" and "screamed," but it just didn't work as well.

So I'm all for "said."

Yeah...

"Said" is often better than some other words such as "stated" or "exclaimed" (well, "asked" is usually fine.) First, they shouldn't be necessary, because of the words or some other punctuation mark instead of a comma or period, or use of italicization. Second, they often distract from the words being spoken, and drag it down, you could say.

Often, no word is better than "said." Dialogue tends to flow better without it, and it starts to get on the reader's nerves if there's too much repetition. Plus, it's often unnecessary. Though if you don't overuse it, it's fine.

I won't judge a writer's skill just on their talent with dialogue, but their writing is probably better if they only use "said" a little, because dialogue is usually better that way, and if they know how to write good dialogue, I'm guessing they're not terrible at other writing.

I find it annoying if an entire book uses just "said," but not because it makes the writer look lazy. It doesn't take much effort to replace "said" with another word, so whether or not an author does says little about his/her writing skills. However, if an author overuses said-bookisms, he/she might be trying too hard to impress. Said-bookisms don't tell the reader anything they can't already tell from the dialogue, they're distracting, and they're even more annoying than repeatedly saying "he said, she said."

The only purpose of a speech tag is to let the reader know who's talking. The author can make this clear in other ways, for example stating a character's action and then following it up with dialogue. The author might not have to say who's speaking at all if it's already obvious. Asked, mentioned, or replied are all good substitutes for "said" without standing out too much.

In my opinion, speech tags should only be used when necessary, and shouldn't be overly repetitive or distract from the dialogue. I'm for the use of the word "said," but only to a certain point.

~KBNB♥

I never get annoyed when an author uses "said" often in his or her novel. Sometimes certain sentences and phrases call for the usage of "said" and there's really no way of getting around it, unless it's a phrase where you could use a better verb like "whispered" or "stuttered".

I think the only time an author is lazy or just plain bad is when they have the chance to use another, more creative word than "said", but doesn't take the opportunity. Nice question =)

Hey

Great q. XD

I think, if you look at some of the 'top-end' books, 'said' is the tag that is most often used. The reason why I'm for this is stated on the Guardian web:

Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue. The line of dialogue belongs to the character; the verb is the writer sticking his nose in. But "said" is far less intrusive than "grumbled", "gasped", "cautioned", "lied". I once noticed Mary McCarthy ending a line of dialogue with "she asseverated" and had to stop reading and go to the dictionary.

----

In my opinion, it can also disrupt the flow, I find it easier to read as it's just a tag, it's not supposed to attract attention, it can withdraw you from the piece. Some variations from time to time I can accept, but otherwise, I don't really like it.

What do you think?

~ JLT

Anything I have read up on about using the word "said" has said lol, that you should use it because it helps to identify who is speaking or has spoken. It is ok to change it up a little, but only a little. I actually find that when an author keeps trying to use other words instead of said only makes me think they are overdoing it sometimes. Another way is to just keep going after the quotations with something that person is doing. eg. "I don't want to go over and talk to her." James was embarrassed by the lack of experience he had. He went anyway, tucking his tail between his legs. Something like that every now and then is good. But mostly, I think the he said, she said works just fine. Usually you don't even notice it. Just my opinion.

Well a lack of saids in a book would be quite impossible for then the language would have to be a little TOO flowery however too many "saids" is quite annoying. Just because a person uses "said" doesn't mean he's not creative but using "said" too much gets boring however using "he deliberated, he sighed, he enunciated, he proclaimed etc." will just make readers bored. :D

I'm for using "said" a whole lot.

Nothing detracts from writing like the constant use of substitutes like, "exclaimed, remarked, returned, commented." Sometimes you can get away with "shouted" and "whispered" since they are necessary.

There is that famous story of the cub reporter who was sent to write a piece on a huge shipment of bananas that had come in at the local dock. He wrote of one banana, then another banana, then a third, but fearing that he had used the word too frequently, he called the next one, "that elongated yellow fruit."

When he showed the piece to his editor, the editor said, "A fourth banana would have been better."