What is a Soliloquy?
A character's thoughts spoken aloud to themselves.
Hearing the Sound of Your Own Thoughts: Understanding Soliloquy in Creative Writing
A soliloquy is a powerful tool in creative writing that allows readers to hear the sound of a character's thoughts spoken aloud to themselves.
It's a moment in the story that provides deeper insight into the character's motivations, fears, and desires. Through a soliloquy, writers can introduce a new perspective or reveal a hidden truth that would be impossible to show otherwise.
Soliloquies can be intense and emotional, giving readers a glimpse into the character's psyche and creating a sense of intimacy between the character and the reader. They also add a level of realism to a story, as thinking out loud is a common human behavior that we all do at some point.
Two examples of soliloquy usage in literature.
Perhaps the most famous example of a soliloquy is Hamlet's 'to be or not to be...' speech, in which he contemplates the nature of existence and the choice between life and death.
In Woolf's novel, the titular character, Clarissa Dalloway, has many soliloquies throughout the story that reveal her inner thoughts and feelings about her life, her relationships, and the world around her.