#1 [url]

Aug 13 07 6:01 PM

QUOTE (Tina @ August 07, 2007 07:00 pm)
the reader will know who's talking just by what's being said.

I don't agree with that. It's not (only) the what, but the how. How characters say things reveals who they are, and sometimes even what they are. This can be very subtile, or rather straightforwards. It's difficult to give examples in English, but men and women don't use the same words, older people talk different that youngsters, people from different cultures have a different way of saying things.
There's people who beat about the bush, or those who never lie, or those who think they are backed up by others ("We don't think that's very clever, isn't it Larry?"), those who come up with something like "In the old days...", "Professor Smith says...", "Many people think..." instead of expressing what they think themselves.