Dialogue can characterize people through hyperbole and deadpan absurdity

Evidence

“You look like a human being,” Sally tells Harry, “but actually you are the angel of death.” … It’s sharply observant, too, about American neuroses, urban fears: “I’m definitely coming down with something,” Harry mutters. “Maybe one of those twenty-four-hour tumors that are going around.” — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 374

Categorization

• XREF: Exemplifies the dialogue-as-characterization technique Mantel herself uses to sketch a person quickly in prose. — connects to: Humor’s timing depends on silence marking the rupture of expected order — George Michelsen Foy, Zero Decibels: The Quest for Absolute…, 260; Writers evoke character through physical gestures and spatial orientation in a scene — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 163; Some persons embody pure negation while irony posits and denies within one act. (+2 more)
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 374

Broader Connections

• Writers evoke character through physical gestures and spatial orientation in a scene #expands (0.50) — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 163
• Humor’s timing depends on silence marking the rupture of expected order #expands (0.45) — George Michelsen Foy, Zero Decibels, 260