Has anyone tried to write in a language they do not speak?

[pocketrocket]

There is a character in one of my stories that has outgrown his welcome. He is from Germany and speaks only a little English.

This all started when a scene turned into a 100,00 words of story. That story turned into three, the other two both larger than the first. The lead character has to go interesting places and meet interesting people. Two of the interesting people meet each other and the pairing is too good not to pursue.

So far I have managed with what I recall of HS German and Google Translate. They are speaking in short sentences, for clarity, and mixing the languages. So far I have managed to muddle through, as a side story. I want at least try to write a story focusing on them. In other words, have dates and sex between two people without a common language.

Any suggestions?

 

[Stella_Omega]

My feeling on this is; If you are writing for an English speaking readership, don't try to write his dialogue in German.

The focus of your story isn't the language itself, but the barrier to understanding. You can express that, while making both characters understandable to the reader.

"He listened in baffled delight to the flow of words. He was beginning to catch a few, he thought; sometimes her English words sounded quite like the German."

Or vice versa, as the case may be.

 

[slyc_willie]

There was a recent thread about this. Some good information can be found here.

 

[Swilly]

As a male, I've written in the strange first person female tongue. As my wife will attest, I do not really understand that baffling language.

 

[TxRad]

As a male, I've written in the strange first person female tongue. As my wife will attest, I do not really understand that baffling language.

That's not a foreign language, it's an alien one.

 

[SamScribble]

Unless you think your reader will be happy to read with a German dictionary at their elbow, I'd give it a wide berth. The last thing you want to do is to interrupt the primary communication.

 

[pocketrocket]

That's not a foreign language, it's an alien one.

I wrote the better part of three novels in that language, with detours into lesbian. The second is easier for a male.

As a matter of practical impact, I find writing the female first person easier to do by changing hats. Respond as a dancer, or dominatrix, or tax assessor as appropriate. When dealing with matters of a sexual nature, arousal is universal. I just wish I could try the multiple orgasm part.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

My feeling on this is; If you are writing for an English speaking readership, don't try to write his dialogue in German.

The focus of your story isn't the language itself, but the barrier to understanding. You can express that, while making both characters understandable to the reader.

"He listened in baffled delight to the flow of words. He was beginning to catch a few, he thought; sometimes her English words sounded quite like the German."

Or vice versa, as the case may be.

Its a thought not a feeling. Feelings are: Mad, sad, glad, afraid, fatigue, hunger, thirst, pain, etc.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Around here English is what kicks the most ass.

 

[oggbashan]

The usual way is to use English with a note that the character is speaking in the other language but with hints of grammatical construction of the other language.

For German, move some verbs at the end. Think Yoda-speak.

Two of my stories are examples:

Golem which has a German doctor actually speaking his version of English:

"So you want woman about six foot six inches tall one hundred seventy pounds weigh?"

"And you must earth from stone circle get. That important is. Circle is magic. Not much earth. Two or three pounds. You do can?"

and

Flawed Red Silk 10: Not a Woman in which I note that most of the dialogue would have been in French but isn't.

(Many of the conversations in this chapter should be in colloquial French but are shown in English. They are not a translation but a re-telling in English.)

Whatever you do to show a different language is being used, all you need is a hint of the effect, not a long-winded passage of text that is difficult to read.

 

[Acktion]

I actually lost my mind and used Latin in .... mmm... I think it was my contest entry last Halloween.

I think it worked all right since it was only about three different paragraphs during a "ritual of sex magick". And anyone that didn't want to open the cereal box "prize" to decipher the dirty joke hidden inside could ignore it as "filler" or "setting" and shrug it off.

The only other one that I can recall writing that had a foreign language in it was an unsubmitted V-Day story with phrases from colloquial Tex-Mex peppered around throughout that didn't get finished in time.

As a reader, though, I can say that while I can usually parse pretty "fair to middlin'", if it becomes a classroom exercise like those damn tapes that have a line in the alternate language followed by a line in my own tongue, I get bored pretty quick.

Writing is first and foremost a visual form of communication. To have communication, both the originator and the receiver have to have a clue what is being said. If the receiving end not only can't understand but reaches a point that they don't even feel like trying, then I'm afraid the story would fall upon deaf ears... er, eyes...

Aw, hell. Which way to the "Metaphor Mixer" thread?

 

[StrangeLife]

I'm still pondering the idea of writing a story in Klingon...

 

[pocketrocket]

Tolkien wrote in old Welsh and called it elvish, Finnish for dwarves.