There's a particular quality to silence I find myself drawn to in writing. Not the absence of sound, but the presence of something unspoken. A weight. A meaning that exists in the gaps between words.
In my work, what isn't said often carries as much significance as what is. A character's hesitation. The space between sentences. The things left unsaid in dialogue. These are the moments where meaning accumulates, where the reader is invited to participate in creating understanding.
This isn't about withholding information for the sake of mystery. It's about recognizing that some truths are too complex for direct statement. That some emotions are too layered for simple expression. Silence, in this sense, becomes a form of respect: for the complexity of human experience, for the reader's intelligence, for the inadequacy of language itself.
The challenge is making silence visible. Giving absence a presence on the page. This requires careful attention to rhythm, to pacing, to the architecture of a scene. It means trusting that the reader will understand what isn't being said, that they'll feel the weight of what remains unspoken.
In a world that prizes clarity and directness, there's something quietly radical about this approach. It asks the reader to slow down, to listen not just to the words but to the spaces between them, to find meaning in what is absent as much as in what is present.