Writing in a diary format

Schumi

Schumi

I have started writing my first ever novella. It is based around one character that works as a nail technician in her local town. I am starting the story by writing about a certain period of her life in a diary format. The whole of the novella will consist of 3 parts, one from the point of view of my character (the diary), and then onto the other two parts, which I consider to be quite different from the norm.

They are for a later time though, as at the moment I am in the middle of writing my character's diary entries. I've seen many examples of this way of writing fiction, and never previously thought it would come into consideration for a piece of my own writing. But it feels right to do it this way, and what I've written so far doesn't feel forced or contrived in any way. So I am happy with the choice I've made.

However, there are a few things I am uncertain about, and that is how much information can go into a set of diary entries. I've kept a journal for a few years now, but only write in it on occasions. But what I have amassed over the years is a wide variety of opinions and thoughts based on things I believe in and things that play on my emotions etc. That's what I want to get across in my character’s diary, but there is one aspect that I am unsure about. Dialogue. By that, I mean is it workable to include in the diary entries any conversations my character might have had with someone? Or should it be left out altogether?

If I look at first person fiction today, it can be written either in the present or past tense. Past tense novels or short stories obviously have dialogue running throughout them, which means an allowance has to given by the reader because it would surely be impossible for anybody to remember, word for word, the dialogue they engage in over a wide space of time. Does that make sense?

Present tense novels or short stories don't have that trouble, as the character and the reader move along at the same pace, and walk into the unknown together.

So I think what I'm trying to say is for a set of diary entries, is it okay to show a range of conversations my character has with people, even though this isn’t necessarily the standard form of writing that would make up a diary?

Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Jenny

Could you put conversations after each relevant diary entry - perhaps with a suitable title?

Betsie

Well worth looking into how Sue Townsend handled it in Adrian Mole

Jay Mandal

Have you read 'We need to talk about Kevin' by Lionel Shriver? It's in the form of a letter, not a diary, but she uses dialogue. It got her the Orange Prize for Fiction 2005.

Schumi

Thanks for all your replies. If I were to include any dialogue, it would be things that have already been said, either on the day of the entry or before. Recently, I read a novella by Guy De Maupassant called 'The Horla'. In the first part to the story, he writes it in a similar way to a batch of diary entries. He puts the date to the left hand side of the page, and then the character talks about his problems. A few pages in, there is a bout of dialogue between several characters, which is written in past tense and from memory. The layout of the story, and the way he conveyed the dialogue, is along the lines of what I am looking for. But I'm not absolutely sure whether the format he wrote it in could be classed as a diary.

Crazy Horse

Have a quick look at the greatest diary ever written, Samuel Peppys Yes the wording is far more eloquent than we are use to but he describes dialogue raher than recording it..A darist will tend to comment on dialogue rather than a form of reportage. Most passages are concerned with his ability in conversation with  "getting one over" who he is speakig to and I bet many diaries follow this format