Can Drunks Have Serious Conversations?

[The Big Peat]

Wasn't George Brown the source of Private Eye coining Tired and Emotional?

In any case, I can only echo others. There is a huge range of drunkeness, and a huge range of seriousness.

If there is anything I can add, it's that if it makes sense to you, and your life experience says it can happen, include it. If these things are not true, then probably don't.

p.s.

Habitual drinkers can drink a lot of stuff, work up a "profound altered mind state" and still say complex, interesting and very coherent things....but probably unlikely to remember anything the next day!

I once had the same fairly deep conversation with a friend three times because only asked while drunk and forgot they'd done so. Could just be bad memory too.

 

[Don]

I think the problem is that "drunk" likely means different things to different people. There is a continuum of drunkenness from more than a bit tipsy, through singing loudly while standing on tabletops, through puking up all over the next person, all the way to falling down into a near-coma, and that doesn't necessarily reflect how much a person has actually drunk, since everyone reacts to alcohol in a different way, depending on age, sex, size, what else has been ingested, and habituation.

Drinking and thinking are at opposite ends of a single spectrum. Alcoholics are irrational. They do stupid, impulsive things. There's been far too many drunkards in my personal life who try to abuse me. I tell them to go abuse their drinking buddy instead. It's why God made drinking buddies in the first place.

 

[AnRoinnUltra]

I think it's believable that two or more folk would have a serious conversation while drunk. I would buy into that. It probably happens all the time -though the risk of it spilling into over emotional would probably be high so someone saying stuff like 'I've been meaning to tell you that you are the human equivalent of a verruca' might not make sense unless it ended with slaps, kicks and headbutts.

George Brown the source of Private Eye coining Tired and Emotional

Off topic, but I always wondered where that came from -cracks me up as a saying 'did you not think going out the night before and getting completely tired and emotional would be a problem?'

 

[msstice]

I think @The Judge 's question is the key one: why do the characters need to be drunk? I will add, do they need to be drunk in this scene, or can it be split up?

When I've read passages with drunk characters it has often been in a comic context. In rare cases I've seen it used as a way to show a character's superiority e.g. drunk hero still out fights/out thinks/out wits mediocre baddies.

 

[The Big Peat]

Off topic, but I always wondered where that came from -cracks me up as a saying 'did you not think going out the night before and getting completely tired and emotional would be a problem?'

Wiki has the answer - or at least an answer - Tired and emotional - Wikipedia

 

[THX1138]

Here are two writing sites that might help.

How to Write a Drunk Character - brilliantio
How to Write a Drunk Character – All Write Alright

 

[Lafayette]

Drinking and thinking are at opposite ends of a single spectrum. Alcoholics are irrational. They do stupid, impulsive things. There's been far too many drunkards in my personal life who try to abuse me. I tell them to go abuse their drinking buddy instead. It's why God made drinking buddies in the first place.

I think the problem is that "drunk" likely means different things to different people. There is a continuum of drunkenness from more than a bit tipsy, through singing loudly while standing on tabletops, through puking up all over the next person, all the way to falling down into a near-coma, and that doesn't necessarily reflect how much a person has actually drunk, since everyone reacts to alcohol in a different way, depending on age, sex, size, what else has been ingested, and habituation.
In my limited experience that is what I have seen.
"Serious conversation" also can mean very different things. Speaking intelligently and rationally on scientific matters, say, is only likely to happen in the very early stages of tipsiness. Talking in a general way about family matters, or people one hates -- ie things that are commonplace in one's conversation -- would still be possible further on in the process.

That makes sense to me.

But alcohol leads to poor concentration and inferior social and critical judgement, all of which are necessary to hold a conversation which is worth the name -- basically, it's harder to think clearly, and then express those thoughts clearly.
I've seen this too.

Perhaps the question you should be asking yourself is why you're writing people who are drunk and having a conversation.

Initially it was (and still is) to write dimensional characters, to give the readers something to wonder about and to identify with. However, after reading the comments and questions, it has dawned on me that I haven't given this enough serious thought. This being the case, I will do more research on the subject. Oh, the joys of being a pantser.

Granted it might show characterisation, but if you're having this difficulty over one scene, are you likely to want to continue to show them as drunks?

I figure if I can get the first scene written correctly I can do the others as well. No, they are not drunk in all scenes.

Meanwhile, does their drunkeness further the plot in any way?

It might, in the sense that theirs foes may blow them off and not take them seriously. Also it may add another layer (in the eyes of the good guys) of scorn.

Is the conversation one that's important for the reader?

I hope so.

Could you show the conversation separately from the drunkeness?

I could, but that would spoil the fun.

 

[Lafayette]

Why are you telling me this? I was one of the ones in that thread that told you the quoted dialogue doesn't sound drunk.

Because, someone else was saying or implying I hadn't written a drunk scene when actually I did. It just wasn't written well.

 

[AnRoinnUltra]

Wiki has the answer - or at least an answer

Ah class, it was the Eamonn Dunphy quote I was remembering -though it's hard to tell where reality ends and fiction begins with that man!

 

[Wayne Mack]

Perhaps the initial question isn't the correct one? I suggest the question is how does a writer make it seem plausible that characters are both drunk and discussing a serious situation? Has the reader been given sufficient rationale for both?

One possible scenario would be a feeling of hopelessness. There is some bad event coming and the characters do not see any means of thwarting it. As a reader, this gives me a reason to believe that the characters might drink and that they might discuss what is bothering them. One should create a feeling of dread mixed with partial, incomplete thoughts. Some of this might be due to drink and some might be due to not wanting to acknowledge and name what is bothering the characters. I would probably veer away from more comic consequences of drinking, such as slurred speech, stumbling gaits, or unexpected laughter, and concentrate on showing darker emotions and feelings. Do not have the characters discuss what is happening quite as much as what they fear may happen to themselves and others.

There might be other approaches to have a believable combination of drunkenness and serious discussion, but having the characters feel hopeless about an upcoming event could be one way to have them drunk and revealing salient plot points.

 

[Swank]

There are method actors, who become the character as much as possible in order to 'live' them in front of the camera. And then there are all the other excellent actors who think about the lines and try to deliver something useful and interesting.

Too many of these writing discussions feel like method acting.

Another very useful way to write is to conceive of something that interests you (like a serious discussion among drunks) and write the scene to the best of your ability. In the process of making it good, you may find an interesting way to round out a character, or another way to deal with a future plot difficulty, or a way to introduce a little humor into a serious story. Or you might find that you just can't make it work, and you can discard the idea without having first committed to it with complex planning session about why the scene exists.


Writing is too hard to keep conceiving of ideas to put off doing it.

 

[Lafayette]

Here are two writing sites that might help.

How to Write a Drunk Character - brilliantio
How to Write a Drunk Character – All Write Alright

Thanks. Both links have good ideas. However, they're not quick fixes (which is understandable) and I will have to study them.

The links are so good that they lead me to a link about anger management which I can use for the taller character.

 

[THX1138]

Thanks. Both links have good ideas. However, they're not quick fixes (which is understandable) and I will have to study them.

The links are so good that they lead me to a link about anger management which I can use for the taller character.

Yep, you just have to put your own 'twist' into your characters. Good luck!

 

[Lafayette]

n the contrary, if these are meant to be the antagonists,

No, they're not antagonist. They are drinking buddies and it is their habit to drink together. The way I imagine it, they met at an inn, discovered they had things in common: drinking strong liquor, hatred of Elves (and perhaps other minorities), a lust for power, and a wish to take over the world. Neither are weak and both have talents.

to my mind it makes them look weak, and if they're the protagonists it makes them look contemptible. Neither, I would suggest, is helpful to the story.

The hoverball can still be broken, if that is what you think is dramatic

The drama is not the hoverball being broken, but the drama of the two men seeing in the hoverball their troop of orcs being slaughtered and the appearance of the amazonian.

 

[paeng]

Shaw and others did great in Jaws

 

[Fiberglass Cyborg]

I think it depends a lot on just how drunk.... If these guys get the news of a major military setback at the point where they're slurring their words and staggering around, I would expect the dialogue to not be very coherent. More like:
"****! That ****ing ***** and her ****ing elvish ****s ****ed up my boys! My boys! Gorra kill the *****. D'you here me? Gorra ****ing kill the ****, crush 'er like-" [crushes bottle in bare hands, blood spurts everywhere. "****!"

If they're slightly less far gone, it's more believable. Two or three drinks in, I can imagine them struggling to get up to speed with what's happened and what they need to do, and also being a bit more frank with each other than usual.

 

[paranoid marvin]

Shaw and others did great in Jaws

I wonder if they'd really had a few drinks before that scene; it's very convincing. How Shaw didn't get an Oscar for supporting actor I really don't know - he didn't even make the nominees (looks like George Burns got it for 'The Sunshine Boys').

 

[Bren G]

The Roman's said 'In Wine there's truth.' Also, I went to school with a man from mainland China once. He was a very successful business man there. He said, drinking was foundational to doing business with another and integral in the negotiation of contracts (which if I recall correctly, was more about trust, honesty and a handshake.) In fact, he said, in Chinese culture, if you don't drink, I don't trust you. Now. I'm no expert on these matters but I think that settles it.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Recently, I tried writing a scene where two drunks are having a serious conversation regarding events where one is not happy about. I was told by most of the critiquers (except for one) that this was not believable.

So, what are your opinions? I need some serious feedback so I can move on writing my story.

Point is, what is the scene about? It can't be about two drunk men just talking because that's not a story, it's just a setting. And if there's information that can be summarised in the prose then the scene itself is redundant. IMO a scene should be about character conflict, ie, one of them is struggling with something, and this scene underlines a major part of that struggle. That's story. Just talking isn't.

 

[Lafayette]

Point is, what is the scene about? It can't be about two drunk men just talking because that's not a story, it's just a setting.

I like settings because they lend atmosphere. Atmosphere can give us an idea who the characters are and where they come from and maybe where they're going to and why.

And if there's information that can be summarised in the prose then the scene itself is redundant. IMO a scene should be about character conflict, ie, one of them is struggling with something, and this scene underlines a major part of that struggle. That's story. Just talking isn't.

The scene is about a man feeling threaten by an old nemesis gaining allies. It is not a full story, but a part of a story. I believe there is enough taking place in the previous chapter without needing more this one. I believe there is such a thing as overload. I also believe talking is story, because words tell us what may be or may not be inside a character. Words give us (the readers) reasons why we like or dislike certain characters and what we can or not expect from them.