But I Want My Characters To Sound REAL

I have read many books where the characters' dialogue mimics their natural speech.  For example, Scottish highlanders saying, "Dinna fash yerself" and early American pioneers drawling, "Ah reckon thet's a dandy."  I rarely have issues with it.  I love listening to foreign accents, and sometimes reading dialect helps me get into the characters of that particular story.  However, I have come to realize that everyone does not share my opinion.



In my first novel, one of the minor characters is Irish.  I wrote much of her speech in that dialect.  While I  had no difficulties understanding what she was saying (insert sarcastic remark here), my father mentioned on more than one occasion that he found it distracting.  I decided it was not an important enough issue to pursue, and changed much of her words to their proper spelling.  After all, I wanted my readers to enjoy the story, not get hung up over the pronunciation of the word "very".



My daughter is currently reading Janette Oakes's "Love Comes Softly" series.  She has seen the movies multiple times and adores the story.  However, she struggles with reading the dialect.  She says many times she has to stop and re-read characters' words in order to understand what they are saying.



So I thought I would see what the Internet experts have to say. As usual, I discovered a wealth of opinion and advice.  The general consensus among bloggers today is to use grammar, social/cultural idioms, and cadence rather than phonetically spelled dialect.



Some social or cultural sayings automatically identify a character's nationality. (Right, mate?)  If your character says, "Y'all are welcome any time", it is obvious to most readers that the character hails from the Southern part of the US.  We don't have to make an attempt to spell the words like they sound. (Ya'll er wellcum enytime.)



Sometimes the nationality is not as important as the socio-economic status of our character.  If we have an Italian fisherman, we can make his nationality known with description, and his knowledge of the English language by his grammar.  "I like boats.  Wooden boats.  Steel boats have no love, eh?"  We can have faith that our readers will 'hear' the accent.  We don't have to try and spell it out for them. (I likea the boatsa.  The wooden boatsa.  Steela boats, they haf no a-love!)



Consequently, someone who is not a native speaker, but is well educated would have very precise speech.  A character in one of my stories is a native Spanish speaker.  She is married to an American and has lived many years in the US.  Rather than try to mimic the accent, I can help my readers hear it by using the cadence of her speech.  "You will come to dinner now.   Do not forget to wash first."



The main point, I believe, is that dialogue should sound real without causing our readers to have to consciously think about pronunciations.  And while I love reading with an Irish brogue, perhaps I dinna haf to spell the words oot litrally fer my readers ta ken wat I'm sayin.








Happy writing,























www.karinaharrisauthor.com







Lonely Hearts ~ a sweet Christian Romance
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