What's an info-dump?

[Chel]

I finally finished my work-related studies, and am now enjoying a fantastically funny and inspiring course in writing Fantasy. I will take this thread as an omen. It's here, on this forum, right now.

I picked up and dusted off my old WIP and wrote about 5000 words or so in a week - that's a lot, for me. Right now I'm just waiting for the coffee to kick in before I continue...

But, on topic. What started out as a re-telling of a fantastic table-top RPG campaign has grown into a completely different story. The characters of the RPG campaign have a central role in it, but off-screen until the end of the story.

However, I still need to let the reader know what happened to the RPG-characters 10 years ago, so the reader can understand what kind of people they are, and why the male protagonist is as he is. I'm doing this by the male protagonist telling the female protagonist the story in dialogues - the female protagonist is a huge fan of the female character in the RPG-campaign, so she asks a lot of questions.

I have a friend reading through the first 20k or so words right now, so I'll see what she thinks about it... but I have a feeling I'll at some point have to cut most of what I consider huge infodump-sections in half. Might end up with only "Yes, the king and queen released the true gods from their imprisonment. They're bad-ass, ok?"

 

[David Evil Overlord]

Erm, just in case anyone gets confused, you mean an example of infodumping not done at all.

Yes, you're right.

If, the POV character had said to the other guy, "As you know, Bob, it's so great that we live in a world Robert Silverberg extrapolated from the Swingin' Sixties, and he wrote it before AIDS came along, and so we can all have unprotected sex with every willing girl we want to, and thanks to perfect birth control technology, there are 100% no consequences. Ever." THAT would be an infodump.

 

[Abernovo]

I've been thinking (it happens occasionally) about this. I suspect what constitutes an info-dump might change at different parts of a novel.

For instance, at the start, it wouldn't take much to pull a reader out of the story when they're still finding out about the characters.

Later on, once the readers involved in the characters and what's going on, I think they might want to know more of the background, such as politics and history, that caused the events and shaped the characters.

Whatever, I suspect it's a fine line between info-dump and info-deficit, with the right amount perched precariously on it. Just my two pen'orth, for what it's worth.

 

[Dante]

Information, outside of what's necessary to move the plot along, is almost always unnecessary. If you take out a lot of the detail thrown in to add detail or context, the story will survive and will usually have much better flow. I find it best to let things be revealed organically and over time rather than to try to waste words giving reader's a lesson in my world.

 

[Hex]

I suspect it comes down to taste in many cases. I prefer books with less background information, but I suppose you can have too little.

Are any of these info dumps, or would it depend completely on the context? Let's assume this isn't in the middle of an action scene...


The house had been built in 1850. From the window of the front room in 1879, you could have watched the rail bridge falling into the Tay.

#

"It's so nice of you to welcome us. Would you like another cup of tea?"
He passed her his cup. "Thank you. We're glad the house is finally inhabited. They're beautiful homes." He gazed out at the river, flat and grey in the distance. "I love the idea that the original occupant -- he was the captain of a whaler, you know -- could have watched the Tay Bridge disaster from this window."

#

She crumpled the letter in her fist, and stared out of the window at the flat, grey river. Tears burned behind her eyes. Think about something else, she told herself, think about the bridge falling into the river -- all those people who died.

The modern bridge stretched blandly across the water. Of the other, only stumps remained. She glared at them until the tears stopped threatening. Life was short and Richard was an idiot. She tore his letter into pieces and dropped them in the bin.

 

[Susan Boulton]

#

She crumpled the letter in her fist, and stared out of the window at the flat, grey river. Tears burned behind her eyes. Think about something else, she told herself, think about the bridge falling into the river -- all those people who died.

The modern bridge stretched blandly across the water. Of the other, only stumps remained. She glared at them until the tears stopped threatening. Life was short and Richard was an idiot. She tore his letter into pieces and dropped them in the bin.

This is the one that works best for me. It tells me not only something of where she is, but of her state of mind and a problem/relationship she was having with Richard and her opinion of him at that moment.

 

[Warren_Paul]

I actually liked the dialogue one. Felt the most natural to me. Which proves Hex's point, it's taste.

The third one is quite emotional though, which I like too - but wouldn't she want to think about happier things than some disaster? I know, being picky here.

 

[RJM Corbet]

I suspect it comes down to taste in many cases. I prefer books with less background information, but I suppose you can have too little.

Are any of these info dumps, or would it depend completely on the context? Let's assume this isn't in the middle of an action scene...

Those are all perfect examples of how to do it well. Interspersing small paragraphs of information with dialogue is a clever way to handle it, the reader is willing to go with the writer, and the description adds texture too

 

[Susan Boulton]

I actually liked the dialogue one. Felt the most natural to me. Which proves Hex's point, it's taste.

The third one is quite emotional though, which I like too - but wouldn't she want to think about happier things than some disaster? I know, being picky here.

Depends on her state of mind, if she equating her relationship with Richard as the same what happened to the bridge i.e. a disaster and a waste of her life.

The dialogue I felt was a little stilted, but as you say its taste. You honestly have to go with what you feel the story needs. There comes a time when you have to say, enough, this is how I see the scene.

 

[RJM Corbet]

But it's more description there than info dump anyway?

A real info dump is like: Joe was born in the year ... to ... parents who ... etc?

It's stuff that needs to be there, but it quickly becomes boring?

 

[Warren_Paul]

Are any of these info dumps, or would it depend completely on the context? Let's assume this isn't in the middle of an action scene...

Sorry, Hex, didn't see your question there. No, I wouldn't call any of them info-dumps. They were all good ways to get detail in without boring us.


And as a side point, the more I look at the third one, the more I like it. So I take back what I originally said, the third one is my preferred now.

Wait though, I'll be saying the first one soon.

 

[Hex]

I have a feeling that one of the things that distinguishes an info dump from story is that the information appears to be there because the author wants you to know it, not because it has any relevance to the story itself.

So I wonder if the first one would be more likely to come over as dumpy, partly because although it's short, it's also information dense (with the dates and stuff).

The third one, I think, by making it about the letter rather than the bridge perhaps slips the information in more neatly than the other two. Is it because one is distracted by the emotion?

(These aren't real examples from something I've written, incidentally. I was just trying to work out what sort of strategies might be used to reduce perceptions of dumpiness)

 

[Warren_Paul]

So I wonder if the first one would be more likely to come over as dumpy, partly because although it's short, it's also information dense (with the dates and stuff).

Good point, and I'd suspect you are right there. To be honest I think I kinda glazed over the first one, didn't actually pay attention to the dates - which is probably another sign of info-dumping, that my mind just switched off when dates were involved.

 

[Abernovo]

I'd like the first one if a character was admiring a house. The third one works best for me as a scene, though. Because of the emotion.

I like just enough background information, but not too much. I'd always prefer to learn it as I go along and, even then, not have every little thing detailed. If there's been a revolution and a house is burnt out, I can fill in that gap myself - tragedy, suffering, loss.

 

[Ursa major]

I have a feeling that one of the things that distinguishes an info dump from story is that the information appears to be there because the author wants you to know it, not because it has any relevance to the story itself.

Apart from the obvious - that people don't usually talk in that way - this is a major reason why those dialogues along the lines of, "You know how we joined as cadets on the same day and that you married my cousin Betty, who's got such glossy black hair...," stick out: the fourth wall is being broken, and the characters seem to know that someone else is there, listening.

It isn't only clumsy; it seems designed to break the reader's suspension of disbelief, which is something we, as writers, don't usually want to do.

 

[RJM Corbet]

But it's the bridge disaster from the past? That's the information. So instead of writing it like: in the year ... the Tay bridge had collapsed, killing ... people -- instead it's neatly woven in.

But its just a couple of sentences. I don't know if it qualifies as an 'info dump' which might have to go on for pages of history or explaining the politics or something like that? It's necessary to understanding the story, but you know the reader's not going to tolerate having to plough through it all, so it needs to be broken up and somehow flavoured and served in smaller, hopefully palatable portions?

 

[David Evil Overlord]

The easiest way to infodump is to have what is sometimes referred to as the "As you DON'T know, Bob..."

In other words, you have a character ignorant of the basics needed to survive in the world he or she suddenly finds themselves in (yes, Harry Potter, I'm looking at you). More experienced characters bring the naive character up to speed, while doing the same thing for the reader.

In the example I've used upthread (Robert Silverberg's Up The Line), the character is an unemployed history graduate. The guy from the bar points out most history graduates he knows are employed by the time travel agency.

And when Our Hero joins, he has to go through some training before he's allowed to fiddle while history burns...

 

[Toby Frost]

... As I did the billion press-ups that the sadistic instructors had kindly given me, I wondered why only soldiers could vote in our perfect utopia. Was it just dewy-eyed militarism? Then I remembered my history teacher's lecture on the subject, which ran exactly thus...

Moving briskly on, I have been guilty of this myself. I always hope that the infodump is brisk enough not to jar the reader excessively. This may be heresy, but I don't see anything too wrong with a passage like this:

The world seemed to be getting worse by the minute, he thought. Last month, they had introduced the Law of X. Last week, the government had made Y illegal. Now, it was a capital offence to talk to a woman whilst in the possession of either ice cream or string. He lit another cigarette and glanced nervously at the fridge.

So long as it then gets back to the story. The ultimate example, though, must surely be in 1984, where Winston starts reading a book (cue authorial lecture in the guise of the book's text) and then stops (lecture over). In 1984, it is allowable, however: partly because of the prose quality, and also because the book takes us further to answering the question of why and how the world is in its current condition, which is arguably central to the story.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

This may be heresy, but I don't see anything too wrong with a passage like this:

The world seemed to be getting worse by the minute, he thought. Last month, they had introduced the Law of X. Last week, the government had made Y illegal. Now, it was a capital offence to talk to a woman whilst in the possession of either ice cream or string. He lit another cigarette and glanced nervously at the fridge.

It's exactly the sort of thing that a character might be thinking, so it certainly passes the "don't pull the reader out of the story" test. I think a passage like that works.