Dialog with an anonymous speaker.

[msstice]

I want a few paragraphs of dialog between my MC and a character who is not immediately named. I find it comes out very clumsy how I write it. It's always "The thin man said" or "The man in the blue suit said" which becomes very awkward very quickly. How is this done best? Should the MC have an internal nickname for the character, like "Blue Suit." so it becomes "Blue Suit said ..." ?

 

[The Big Peat]

Internal nickname is good. Just calling him "the man" works too. Or just don't have any dialogue tags for the stranger and have the MC only think of them once.

 

[Swank]

Don't use anything.

"I like Meatloaf."
John nodded, "Meatloaf is delicious."
"Not the food, the artist. I have his full catalog."
"Sorry. It's just that I haven't eaten..." John lapsed into embarrassed silence.
"Quite understandable. Can I interest you in some?"
John perked up. "Something to eat?"
"No, a greatest hits album."


You can get away with just throwing in dialogue tags every other or less. As long as the reader can follow the back and forth because one of them is clear, the other will be to. Obviously, this only works with two people talking.

And then there are personal pronouns.

 

[paranoid marvin]

As Swank example shows, you don't need to name the person as long as you can clearly follow the conversation. If you wish to name them, the protagonist could come up with something based on their appearance, voice or personal habits (eg 'Cigarette Smoking Man' in the X Files).

 

[Wayne Mack]

Have you simply tried minimizing the dialog tags and beats? As long as it's a two person conversation, there can be a lot of back and forth before the reader needs to be reminded of who is speaking. Even if there are more characters present, as long as only two of them are speaking, few tags are needed. From the sample above, I'd try it like:

The man behind the counter smiled at John. "I like Meatloaf."

"Meatloaf is delicious."

"Not the food, the artist. I have his full catalog."

"Sorry," said John. "It's just that I haven't eaten..."

"Quite understandable. Can I interest you in some?"

"Something to eat?"

"No, a greatest hits album."