Dialogue question

[geronimo_appleby]

I'm doing a first-person piece from a Brit point-of-view. One of the characters is from the USA.

It's been suggested by a friend that perhaps I could use American spellings in the American's dialogue. It was only a suggestion, not an instruction - and i'm not planning to do so, but simply wondered if anyone else would consider doing so in their writings.

I can see potential problems with pissing-off readers as well as missing some of the changes as I type the scenes out.

Anyway, there it is.

Have at it.

 

[legerdemer]

I'm doing a first-person piece from a Brit point-of-view. One of the characters is from the USA.

It's been suggested by a friend that perhaps I could use American spellings in the American's dialogue. It was only a suggestion, not an instruction - and i'm not planning to do so, but simply wondered if anyone else would consider doing so in their writings.

I can see potential problems with pissing-off readers as well as missing some of the changes as I type the scenes out.

Anyway, there it is.

Have at it.

I wouldn't, if it were me and it were the other way around - I think it would be too distracting. I would try to be consistent with the rest of the writing. Which is not to say I wouldn't throw in some American expressions and slang in the US character's dialog (oh yea, dialogue).

 

[geronimo_appleby]

I wouldn't, if it were me and it were the other way around - I think it would be too distracting. I would try to be consistent with the rest of the writing. Which is not to say I wouldn't throw in some American expressions and slang in the US character's dialog (oh yea, dialogue).

thanks. that was pretty much what i thought would come up - no pun intended.

 

[SamScribble]

I think of dialogue as an aural thing. Spelling is the author's domain, but what reaches the reader's ear is the character's 'voice'. I'd suggest that you a pick a position and stay with it.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

I think of dialogue as an aural thing. Spelling is the author's domain, but what reaches the reader's ear is the character's 'voice'. I'd suggest that you a pick a position and stay with it.

sorta have. dialogue in amercanese - yanno, i was gonna, anyway kinda thing - with the spellings in English.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

In World War 2 German spies dressed as Americans got caught after they spoke like Brits.

That said, some writers start with vernacular and drop it after the character is established.

 

[Hypoxia]

Listen to your inner critic. If a voice sounds wrong to you, change it. I'm cooking a story of a Canadian in 1940 Britain. It's written for LIT's usual USA audience so the spellings are USAnian while the phrasings are appropriate for the speakers' nationalities. I omit common inconsistencies like color/colour. Just tell the story in the language that feels comfortable to you.

 

[lovecraft68]

You can use the slang of both countries to show they are from different places, but keep the spelling consistent.

The two different speech patterns-if you do it well-will be fun, the spelling will screw with people.

 

[Handley_Page]

I commend that you have the 'Brit' in decent BBC English, as like she is spoken, and
the Yank in normal American.
I don't think you need to go into advanced spelling lessons; it could detract from what your character is saying.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

Listen to your inner critic. If a voice sounds wrong to you, change it. I'm cooking a story of a Canadian in 1940 Britain. It's written for LIT's usual USA audience so the spellings are USAnian while the phrasings are appropriate for the speakers' nationalities. I omit common inconsistencies like color/colour. Just tell the story in the language that feels comfortable to you.

wouldn't a canadian probably use 'colour'?

*sprint*

 

[geronimo_appleby]

I commend that you have the 'Brit' in decent BBC English, as like she is spoken, and
the Yank in normal American.
I don't think you need to go into advanced spelling lessons; it could detract from what your character is saying.

absolutely. top-hole, old bean, etc.

 

[beachbum1958]

My two cents worth

If the story is being told by a Brit, then the spelling should probably remain consistent, IMO; the pronunciation is the same after all, and it just seems a little weird to suddenly swap one spelling for another just because one protagonist is from America where the spelling differs but the pronunciation remains the same.

When I write all-American characters, in a story set in the US, I use the American spelling, because my American wife insists on it, and because it makes internal sense to me. When my story is set in the UK, with Brit characters, then my spelling reverts to the Queen's English, and any American who objects is reminded it's my language, the mother of theirs, and they should go and refer to the Oxford English Dictionary, or perhaps write their own story and use the spelling they're familiar with.

I'm a firm believer in the dynamic, vibrant evolution of our two languages (and American English is diverging from English English on an almost daily basis, making it, in my opinion a new and emerging language all of it's own); English spoken in England is becoming more and more interspersed with pop-speak, youth-speak, and techno-speak, something like the 'New Speak' Burgess created in 'A Clockwork Orange', whereas American English is salted with fragments and phrases from just about every immigrant group who settled there and slowly blended in, and evolving new meaning far from the original intent, creating a rich, even more diverged version of English.

I suspect in 100 years or so we will either be mutually incomprehensible, as the language diverges even further, or we'll all be speaking some sort of universal, mid-Atlantic 'New Speak' that's evolved out of the continuous linguistic cross-pollination that is already in evidence today. In my mind, the second is the more likely possibility.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

If the story is told by a Brit its likely incoherent, scatter logical, and larded with I DONT KNOW, DO I?

 

[NOIRTRASH]

The OP is a cunt. Sad but true.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

The OP is a cunt. Sad but true.

self-labelled, dim-wit. you not seen the tag-line?

jesus, some people...

 

[Handley_Page]

absolutely. top-hole, old bean, etc.

Don't even think it.
That sort of lingo went out with the second world war.

 

[BuckyDuckman]

I'm doing a first-person piece from a Brit point-of-view. One of the characters is from the USA.

It's been suggested by a friend that perhaps I could use American spellings in the American's dialogue. It was only a suggestion, not an instruction - and i'm not planning to do so, but simply wondered if anyone else would consider doing so in their writings.

I can see potential problems with pissing-off readers as well as missing some of the changes as I type the scenes out.

Anyway, there it is.

Have at it.

If it's in the first person, shouldn't the story be told with the natural language of the story's speaker? That's what I would think, so even the American might sound a bit British at times - unless the storyteller wanted to emphasise they way the American said something.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

Don't even think it.
That sort of lingo went out with the second world war.

oh, cripes! that's what i get for learning English from Enid Blyton books!

golly, i feel such a duffer, now.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

If it's in the first person, shouldn't the story be told with the natural language of the story's speaker? That's what I would think, so even the American might sound a bit British at times - unless the storyteller wanted to emphasise they way the American said something.

i'm opting for a Brit narration with the vernacular appropriate to each character. it's only a scuzzy incest piece! no biggee.

 

[Bramblethorn]

oh, cripes! that's what i get for learning English from Enid Blyton books!

golly, i feel such a duffer, now.

Vould be worse, you could've learned it from Molesworth!

 

[geronimo_appleby]

Vould be worse, you could've learned it from Molesworth!

i have one of her notebooks.

 

[MarkoAaron]

In World War 2 German spies dressed as Americans got caught after they spoke like Brits.

That said, some writers start with vernacular and drop it after the character is established.

Lmao! Thanks for sharing that. Apologies to the OP for being off topic.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

Lmao! Thanks for sharing that. Apologies to the OP for being off topic.

no worries. i don't give a fuck.