Relationships: What she can't say, and what he won't tell

If your partner serves you soggy custard creams or shuffles off to the corner of the sofa, they are probably trying to tell you something.

ONE of the lessons that I teach my creative writing students is the importance of subtext – what is really being said, as opposed to what is apparently being said. One can learn about this by, for instance, reading great movie scripts – in Casablanca, nearly everything is implied rather than stated directly.