Tone is the attitude you express toward your subject matter. It's not only about what you say, but how you say it. It often occurs naturally, without much thought, and can be expressed through the use of vocabulary, sentence structure, and punctuation. It can be subtle or obvious.
In daily life, we constantly use tone to express ourselves without even noticing. We stress words, or effortlessly change the tone of our voices to express certain feelings. But writing is a bit more complicated: appropriately using tone may take a bit of premeditated thought.
What is tone?
Before getting too bogged down in the details, it's important to understand on a fundamental level what tone really is, and why it's so important. It's easy to state a definition, but the best way to explain tone is through a simple example.
Here are two quotes from two different movie reviews, one with a positive tone and one with a not-so-positive tone, both of the recent blockbuster film Avatar:
Review #1:
"At a running time of 2 hours and 42 minutes, Avatar never overstays its welcome and manages to be a brilliant, visual extravaganza that’s simultaneously thrilling, provocative and surprisingly moving. It’s destined to become a sci-fi classic." - The NYC Movie Guru
Review #2:
"Avatar is overlong, dramatically two-dimensional, smug and simplistic. It preaches a sermon about our duty towards the preservation of the environment while leaving the biggest trail of carbon footprints since Godzilla trampled New York." - The Observer
Without labeling either, it's abundantly clear which review is positive and which is negative.
Word usage and diction play a large role in tone, and that is very clear in the above examples. In the positive review, you see words such as "brilliant" and "thrilling," indicating a favorable view of the film. In the negative review, you see "overlong" and "simplistic."
The choice of these words is no accident.
The author of the negative review also uses allusion and figurative language to take a jab at the irony of Avatar's message ("the biggest trail of carbon footprints since Godzilla trampled New York.")
Both reviews successfully convey the attitude and opinion of their respective authors, thanks in most part to tone.
How to use tone
When deciding what tone to use for any given project, you should consider who your audience is, what their expectations are, and why you are trying to convey your particular message. In many cases, you also need to understand how you feel toward your subject matter.
Why knowing your audience is important
When it comes to tone, knowing your target audience will prepare you for deciding which type of tone is appropriate. The most obvious choice is between a formal and an informal tone.
Modifying tone to meet the expectations of your audience
Choosing between formal and informal writing is like deciding what to wear: if you're going to a business meeting, you'll wear a suit and tie. If it's a social gathering, you'll put on something more casual. It comes down to who you're writing for and the goals you wish to accomplish.
Technical writers, for example, will use a formal, matter-of-fact tone, because their purpose is to convey information in a clear and concise manner, and the expectation of their audience is to be able to read and understand that information without any subjective interference on the part of the author. On the other hand, satirists will use a casual, humorous tone to convey their message, because their purpose is to entertain and bring to light social issues in a comical way.
However, meeting the tonal expectations of your audience is about more than choosing between formal and informal writing. You have to consider certain other things, such as the target age of your audience, their maturity and education level, and their sensitivity (for instance, using strong language would not be appropriate when writing for children, or for a community church newsletter).
Understanding the purpose of your message
Are you writing to inform? To entertain? Perhaps your goal is to persuade your audience, or to share your opinion on a topic. The purpose of your message will help you determine the appropriate tone to go with it.
Using the example above, the purpose of the technical writer's message is to inform, and so he or she will attempt to convey that message in the clearest way possible, while avoiding superfluous details. In truth, the technical writer will take a very detached approach to conveying information, without any subjectivity whatsoever.
Likewise, again using movie reviews as an example, if your review is positive, you'll want to use a positive tone. Your goal, in that case, is to convey your personal and/or professional opinion regarding a movie, and using the correct tone (positive or negative) will help you accomplish that goal.
There is also a clear distinction to be made here when considering your audience and the goal of your message. Take, for example, the grade-school teacher. Her job is also to inform, like the technical writer, but as she will be conveying this information to younger children in a more informal setting, she'll use a slightly more casual (and perhaps fun) approach, modifying her tone to both meet her desired goal (teaching) and reach her target audience (younger children).
As a writer, you should combine your knowledge of both your target audience and your goal to decide the appropriate tone with which to convey your message.
How your personal feelings affect tone
Tone comes down to how you convey emotion in your writing. With a formal tone, your writing will lack emotion. It will be focused and professional. With an informal tone, your personal feelings will be more apparent.
In informal writing in particular, you also have to consider what kind of emotion you're trying to get across to your reader. Are you happy about your topic? Sad? Angry? In this case, you need to clearly understand your own viewpoint and emotions.
Think of persuasive writing. How you feel about your topic is very important, as you must first understand how you feel about a topic before even hoping to change the views of others. By sharing your personal emotions and using the correct tone to go along with those emotions, you'll have a much better chance of successfully conveying your message and accomplishing your goals.
Tone in fiction (and, yes, the conclusion!)
Much of what is stated above will apply to any form of writing, fiction or non-fiction. However, when working on fiction, you'll have a few particular details to work out, not the least of which are your narrative tone and the tone of your characters' dialogue. These are topics for another day, unfortunately, as this post is already hovering over 1000 words.
Figuring out tone is one of those things that is simple at first glance, but somewhat nuanced if you look beneath the veil. It is, for the most part, something you'll know intuitively when you first begin to write, but it's always something to consider. And, chances are, this topic will pop up a few more times in the future. You have been warned.
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