: Re: How to write a character who uses a lot of smalltalk without boring the reader? Since a lot of what they say is by definition irrelevant to the plot should I just skim over it? I'm worried

Adding to the answers already given:

1) If your POV allows it, you can add humor or pathos (or both) by continually interrupting the blathering with the main character's thoughts. Those thoughts can be internal commentary on the inane blather, or juxtaposed seriousness.

2) When people rudely interrupt the blatherer it can be quite humorous. Think Archie Bunker.

3) The blathering itself can be quite funny, especially if it keeps veering further and further off-track. (Think Edith Bunker, and lots of Shakespeare clowns.)

4) Giving only snatches of the (continual) blathering can be very effective. This would work best with 1st-person POV (where of course the 1st person is NOT the blatherer).

Just don't overdo it. You have to keep interrupting the blathering with something. Nobody wants to read 3 paragraphs of non-stop blathering. In movies/TV, one can have that, because other stuff is going on simultaneously. The blathering then turns into background noise, either because visual events have captured your main attention or because the volume is reduced below "foreground dialogue". In a novel, you must use other techniques to turn the blathering into background noise (which occasionally intrudes into the foreground).

Literary examples that come to mind: The pushy lady in "The Catbird Seat" by James Thurber; Mr. MacCawber in "David Copperfield"; Mr. Collins in "Pride and Prejudice".

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: Re: How to write a character who uses a lot of smalltalk without boring the reader? Since a lot of what they say is by definition irrelevant to the plot should I just skim over it? I'm worried

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