I have the opportunity to read a lot of unpublished content, and every so often I find a story where the writer doesn't let their readers do the emotional work. I've heard the writing rule that if your character is crying, then your reader doesn't have to. At first I wasn't sure how much I agreed with it, but after I read it, I started paying attention.
Here are the examples I ran into. Harry Potter: while Harry is on the verge of crying several times in the series, he almost never does. Fact: I cried more in those books than any other book I've ever read. And thousands of people cried too. In Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, Jean Valjean weeps several times just in the first 200 pages. I never cried once. (And anyone who knows the story, knows how heart wrenching it is.)
If Harry broke down and bawled all the time, I don't know that I would have. I may have still gotten teary-eyed, but I don't think I would have sobbed like I did. There is something about having your character cry that takes the tension out of the reader. The character is doing the emotional work, so the reader doesn't have to.
I soon realized this applied to more than crying. In one unpublished story I read, one of the characters was often worrying about a mystery. She asked all the questions, did all the wondering, the worrying, and I found that I, as a reader, didn't have to. And you know what? I wasn't as engaged. The author didn't let me do that part. So instead of participating in the story, I was merely "watching" it.
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| I Open at the Close by Yume Dust |
In fact, I've come to accept that those passages where I was bawling my eyes out were moments where I was vicariously crying as Harry. And that's what you want as a writer. You want your readers to be in the character, in the story, because only then can they reach that deep, emotional plane where the story leaves an indelible mark on them.
So when your character is sad, anxious, fearful, embarrassed, or angry, instead of focusing on how the character feels and reacts emotionally to it, focus on how to elicit those emotions in your readers, so that they become part of the story. This is often done by focusing on the event that caused those emotions and rendering it in a way that amplifies those emotions. For example, how much emotion do these sentences conjure?
Harry watched Sirius fall through the archway to his death. Harry couldn't believe it. He was upset and started crying.
How much more emotion does this passage conjure?
It seemed to take Sirius an age to fall. His body curved in a graceful arc as he sank backward through the ragged veil hanging from the arch. . . .
