Dialoguing exercise

DIRECTIONS: Dialoguing as a writing exercise is a great way to explore ideas. I'm not talking about book dialogue here, but rather an exercise where you write down a conversation between two entities as if it were the text of a play. One of these entities will be you. For our purposes here, the other entity will be your topic. (From Lesson 3)

Conversation with Marie, a vampire without a memory.

Me: I named you Marie. Are you ok with this name?

Marie: I guess so. I don’t remember what name I was born with. I suppose anything is good until I can remember who I am, where I came from.

Me: It must be confusing for you… having no memory.

Marie: It is. I don’t like having to rely on others. But I learn quickly so I don’t have to for long.

Me: I can understand that. I think that is part of what gives you your humanity.

Marie: I wasn’t always a vampire. I suppose I have to have some humanity remaining.

Me: True, but often the older vampires lose that, forget human morals.

Marie: I have no morals to lose.

Me: Good point.

Marie: Is that why you created me? To give me humanity?

Me: In part. Also, I wanted to play with the idea of what a vampire who had no memories, who had no loyalty to a sire and aligned herself with human might do.

Marie: It makes me very lonely sometimes.

Me: I know. I’m sorry for that truly. But you won’t always be. I promise.

Marie: Well I don’t want to be surrounded by humans trying to kill me all the time.

Me: Well you won’t be…. Vampires want to kill you to.

Marie: WHAT? Why? What did I do to them?

Me: Sorry… getting ahead of myself.

Marie: I don’t think I want any part of this story when you have people and vampires hunting me down.

Me: Aren’t you curious about how you overcome all this though?

Marie: *sniff* Maybe.

Me: *smile* Because you do. Of course, you have to, you’re the main character.

Marie: *smile* Do I get to have any freaky super powers?

Me: Freaky from a vamp with no memory? Well, no, you aren’t a superhero after all. But you have super speed, hearing, sight, smell…

Marie: Why can’t I have a super power? All that other stuff is boring. Don’t your readers want me to kick ass?

Me: Well I hope so. But super powers…? Ok, what were you thinking about?

Marie: I dunno… you’re the writer.

Me: Yea, but you asked the question.

Marie: Fly?

Me: Like in every other vamp story.

Marie: Stop time?

Me: Been done.

Marie: *huff* But I want to do something cool.

Me: You stop the bad vamps and save the boy. That isn’t cool?

Marie: One – how do I stop the bad guys? And, two – is he cute?

Me: One – I am working on that. And two – yes.

Marie: Well it seems like you have to have number one figured out or number two won’t matter. But I am no writer.

Me: Yea, thanks for the advice. I said I am working on it. I have an idea, just need to flush it out more. But it goes back to your creation.

Marie: Creation? What am I, the Bible?

Me: Sheesh. You had less attitude when you first emerged. No, I mean when you were made a vamp and how you ended up the way you did, without a memory, feeding on animals rather than having bloodlust for humans.

Marie: So I do get back my memory?