‘Show, don’t tell.’ The creative writing mantra. I’m grappling with the reality of that right now in my current novel. Describing a road traffic accident … doing justice to someone’s philosophising … capturing a child’s resentment … I feel like a tightrope walker. Will the reader understand the subtle nuances of this section? Am I respecting his/her intelligence? Or am I being patronising?

I’m reminded of an elderly patient who came into the Accident and Emergency Department where I worked many moons ago. She was complaining of acute pain in her knees. After sending her for an X-ray the junior doctor breezed up to her confidently and the conversation went something like this.
Doctor: I think you’ve got a little bit of arthritis in your knees.
Patient: Pardon?
Doctor (louder): I think you’ve got arthritis in your knees.
Patient: You’ll have to speak up.
Doctor (shouting): You’ve got arthritis in your knees.
Patient (shaking her head): Can you speak more slowly?
Doctor (bellowing and tapping his own knees): ARTHRITIS. KNEES.
When he’d gone to try his luck on some other unfortunate, the lady wrote on the ‘Survey of outpatient experience’ form, ‘I don’t think this doctor’s very clever.’

Actually he went on to become a professor but for her that day he didn’t get the balance between information and sensitivity right. And the final message had changed.

That’s my grapple this week.

Tags: Accident and Emergency, philosophising, Show don't tell