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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/26220
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/26220
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

To answer this question you have to consider the purpose of detail. The purpose of detail is to refine the picture in the reader's head. Readers pull images from their own stock of experiences to build a picture of what they are reading. Each detail you add refines the selection of images they make. If you say "bus" they select an image of the kind of bus they are most familiar with. If you say "red double-decker bus" they probably select an image of a London bus, unless they live in another city with red double-decker buses.

The image in the reader's head will probably never match the image in your head perfectly, unless you have had the exact same experience. The question is, how close do I need the image in the reader's head to be to the image in my head for them to receive the story, its mood and texture as well as its plot, in the way I intend. You add detail until you think the reader's image will be close enough to your own for story purposes.

I disagree with those who say you should leave something to the reader's imagination. That's moot. It all comes from the reader's imagination. You job is to direct that imagination into the right channels so that the reader receives the experience you are attempting to create.

A closely related question is, how closely do you paint each scene and each object in a scene. The more you refine an image, the more important you make that image. Don't make any image more important in a scene than it is in the story, or you will divert the reader's attention away from what matters in the story.

Finally, it is really more about finding the right detail than it is about the amount of detail. Think of it like a database query on the user's stock of experiences. Certain details will pull up certain images whole and intact. A swastika armband may be the only detail you need to pull up the image of a Nazi soldier, for instance. This is what is often called the telling detail, and finding the telling detail is far more important than how much detail you provide. The telling detail can not only pull out a particular object but the entire scene, the entire time and place to which that object belongs. Thus the red double-decker evokes London, the swastika armband evokes Nazi Germany.

Finally, be wary of details that seem contradictory or are hard to integrate. Adding one more term to a database query can turn it from retrieving a very precise image to returning no data at all.

Original score: 5