Show or tell: what is it when it's at home?

[TranquillityBase]

I would like to know people's thoughts on this frequently brought up angle in many critiques.

I am frankly often confused by the difference.  That is, I have hard time sometimes seeing the dividing line.  It seems like every poem is a telling.  I do understand the importance of showing, since images are sort of the blood of poetry.  

Maybe I'm the only person who doesn't quite get it.  Analysis is not one of my strong points.

Anyway, enlighten me!

[brynmawr1]

I would like to know people's thoughts on this frequently brought up angle in many critiques.

I am frankly often confused by the difference.  That is, I have hard time sometimes seeing the dividing line.  It seems like every poem is a telling.  I do understand the importance of showing, since images are sort of the blood of poetry.  

Maybe I'm the only person who doesn't quite get it.  Analysis is not one of my strong points.

Anyway, enlighten me!

Hi TqB,

I often have this question as well so you are not alone.  On the prose side of things, I think it's called "dramatizing" which to me means creating a scene that conveys the emotion, back story, under story, etc without explicitly telling the reader all the gory details.  At least that is my understanding.  I think one of the criticisms of telling is that it lends itself too much in telling the reader how they should feel rather than letting the reader come to it on their own.  That's my understanding from some things that I have read and experienced in comments of my own writing.  My question is, "Is it always bad writing, and if not, when is it appropriate?"
Like you, I am interested in hearing a more sophisticated explanation.

[dukealien]

I don't exactly disagree, but after a bit of analysis I think the difference may be feelings.  Specifically, telling has to do with someone's feelings, the reader's, the author's, the viewpoint character's.  It describes a state of mind, whether that's analytical, emotional, or whatever.  Showing is not so much a positive thing, then, as a negative:  it does *not* tell the reader what anyone thinks or feels.  "The rainbow was enchanting, and brought hot tears of memory and regret to Emily's eyes," is telling.  "The rainbow swept from housetop to housetop, fading only slightly at the ends into a sparkling tinsel mist," doesn't include any feelings.  There can be people in "showing," but not what they're thinking or why.  Is showing objective, then?  It seems to be expecting to be taken as fact rather than opinion, though of course the author's opinions are involved.  So is it a lie?  Well, it's art.  Perhaps there's a hybrid:  "Darren saw a bright, leathery orange and two cloudy purple plums in the Rookwood bowl, and thought about the Solar System in its gravity well."

[Poetry In Motion]

I would like to know people's thoughts on this frequently brought up angle in many critiques.

I am frankly often confused by the difference.  That is, I have hard time sometimes seeing the dividing line.  It seems like every poem is a telling.  I do understand the importance of showing, since images are sort of the blood of poetry.  

Maybe I'm the only person who doesn't quite get it.  Analysis is not one of my strong points.

Anyway, enlighten me!

Read into it. Read some literary criticism. Usually, the show don't tell phrase is simple: show me the window bouncing light from the glass instead of telling me that there is.

[busker]

I would like to know people's thoughts on this frequently brought up angle in many critiques.

I am frankly often confused by the difference.  That is, I have hard time sometimes seeing the dividing line.  It seems like every poem is a telling.  I do understand the importance of showing, since images are sort of the blood of poetry.  

Maybe I'm the only person who doesn't quite get it.  Analysis is not one of my strong points.

Anyway, enlighten me!

Telling would be bland narration.
Anything that doesn't tease the mind, fire the neurons.
Showing is painting a picture, but of course not all poems paint pictures. Some of focus on the sonics. Some of them tease the mind differently.

Is the following telling?

Old men ought to be explorers
Here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity

None of the above is bland narration. The first line is intriguing, the third is clever ('still', and 'still moving'. Moving by being still. Focusing the mind. Moving with the mind.) The last line is mysterious again. Another intensity? What would that be like?
But none of them paint a picture.
Then we have the next line, also not painting a picture, but teasing the mind:

For a further union, a deeper communion

Then finally we have something inexplicably wondrous, like the universe just exploded. The petrel and the porpoise, with their endless allusions, both obvious and subtle, both intended by the writer and imagined by the reader. This would be properly showing, the 'vast' makes it so. And the last not-telling line rounds it out.

Through the dark cold and empty desolation,
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
Of the petrel and the porpoise. In my end is my beginning.

[TranquillityBase]

Thank you all for your responses, each is vauable in its own way.  A place for me to go back to, next time the flag is raised.

TqB

[Mark A Becker]

I think one of the criticisms of telling is that it lends itself too much in telling the reader how they should feel rather than letting the reader come to it on their own.  

Well Steve,
I think you hit the nail on the head.
Of course, a certain amount of telling is necessary, and we all struggle with that balance.

[busker]

I think one of the criticisms of telling is that it lends itself too much in telling the reader how they should feel rather than letting the reader come to it on their own.  

Well Steve,
I think you hit the nail on the head.
Of course, a certain amount of telling is necessary, and we all struggle with that balance.

Yea, I think this is the correct answer

[brynmawr1]

I think one of the criticisms of telling is that it lends itself too much in telling the reader how they should feel rather than letting the reader come to it on their own.  

Well Steve,
I think you hit the nail on the head.
Of course, a certain amount of telling is necessary, and we all struggle with that balance.

Yea, I think this is the correct answer

so that's the frustrating thing.  Telling is bad unless it is done well as exampled in Busker's T.S. Elliot poem.  Hard for us beginners to absorb.  Kind of like english as a language.  More exceptions than rules.

[Wjames]

Generally, I would say that 'telling' is the meaning of a poem, whereas 'showing' is the tactile five-sense feeling of a poem.

Showing: I can feel sunlight as a real sensation on my skin, I can visualize the sun in a sunset, I can smell a barbecue in the sun, I can taste the burger in the sun, I can hear the sizzle of the grill in the sun. This is feeling.

Telling: your love is like the sun. This is explaining meaning.

In my opinion, feeling is way more important than meaning in poetry - which is why the "show, don't tell" advice that is common is generally good advice. The feeling of eating a delicious meal has no objective 'meaning', but it is objectively tangible and subjectively beautiful - that's the type of thing I think art is about, communicating (showing) feeling. The opposite, meaning with no feeling - i.e (telling) 'I love you' is much less interesting to me.

I think the strongest writing generally combines showing and telling in a subtle way with metaphor etc that makes both the feeling and meaning stronger, but of course there are no rules in art.

Take my signature for instance, it's a Mitch Hedberg joke - and much more about telling than showing (although showing the image of a hippotamus adds extra absurd feeling to the meaning), but it's beautiful to me even though it skews to 'tell' rather than 'show' - the combination is delightful. I think showing has a higher batting average for generating that delight than telling - but that is just my perspective.

[rowens]

It Staff augmentation.

You not so sly devil.

I banish you jamesfil, or shall I call you, Red Herring?!

[Quixilated]

Your banishing worked, the spammer has been purged. Good catch, rowens.