Yesterday, we posted an article about using the sense of smell in your writing. Today, we have another sense: hearing and sound. Other than dialogue or dramatic sound effects, it can be difficult to think of places to insert auditory experiences into your story. Here to help is C.S. Lakin, with advice from a filmmaker’s perspective.
“Movie scores affect viewers powerfully, eliciting strong emotions that can make moviegoers cry and despair or feel their hearts soaring with joy,” Lakin writes. “But until the day novels are paired with their own music scores that play while being read, writers will have to make do with other ways to portray music and sounds in their novels.”
Filmmakers classify sounds into three categories:
- Natural sounds from the environment
- Expressive sounds, which vary depending on the mood and temperament of the listener
- Surreal sounds, boosted by the character’s imagination
Sounds also can serve as a motif throughout your novel, echoing from scene to scene and evoking certain memories in your characters. ‘A ringing bell can be part of a pastoral landscape coming from a church nearby, but it can also mark time, and symbolize time running out,” Lakin says. As you revise, look for places where you can insert sounds, such as in a bar or restaurant, church, or parade. Even a home can be a source of evocative sounds, from outside traffic, animals, appliances, clocks, and footsteps. Consider your character’s emotional state and whether certain sounds – even their heartbeat – would be amplified at key moments.
