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mary rosenblum
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Good morning all!
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mary rosenblum
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I hope you're having a good
week and if you live in the DC area, I hope you're not treading water!
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gskearney
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If we're lucky maybe a few
lobbyists drowned. LOL
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mary rosenblum
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Yeah, I wonder if business
won't be a bit slow in the capital this week.
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mary rosenblum
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No worries about fires started
by fireworks anyway.
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mary rosenblum
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I have had quite a few
questions lately about the use of slang, dialect, regional accents, and
foreign languages in prose.
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mary rosenblum
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So this seemed like a good
time to talk about it.
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mary rosenblum
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This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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mary rosenblum
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Ideally, your characters are
not you. Ideally they are not all white, middle class, Americans...at least
not in EVERY story.
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mary rosenblum
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Ideally your characters do not
talk like you...
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mary rosenblum
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especially if they come from,
say, Louisiana or Baaaston, and you come from Nebraska.
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mary rosenblum
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One of the craft issues that
is MOST overlooked by novice writers is how characters talk.
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mary rosenblum
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Novice writers tend to worry a
lot about the words, but not about making each character voice distinct.
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mermaid2499
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Would it be wise to find such
people to help get grip on the language?
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mary rosenblum
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Oh certainly! If you can do
it, asking someone who speaks the language to translate bits of dialogue
into his/her language...
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mary rosenblum
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is wonderful. A language
course book only goes so far...and it offers you 'correct' speech...
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mary rosenblum
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rather than idiom.
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mary rosenblum
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But if you're using an obscure
language or you simply can't find an informant, they you can 'fake it'. :-)
And do it pretty realistically.
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mary rosenblum
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As far as dialect or accent
goes...
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mary rosenblum
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talking to someone who has
that accent will help you a lot.
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mary rosenblum
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Essentially, you listen for
the rhythm of the words, the type of idiom that person uses, and the way
the senteces flow...
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mary rosenblum
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so you can recreate it in your
character's voice.
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mary rosenblum
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If you listen to someone with
that accent for some time, you can begin to hear your character use that
same accent.
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mary rosenblum
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And it becomes more a matter
of writing down what you 'hear' in your head than consciously choosing to
insert particular spellings or idiom.
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mary rosenblum
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This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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mary rosenblum
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When I first began writing and
was wrestling with realistic dialogue that didn't ALL sound like me
talking...
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mary rosenblum
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I found it very useful to sift
through all the people I knew...
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mary rosenblum
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and find someone whose voice
'fit' my character...
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mary rosenblum
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and then imagine that person
saying the dialogue the way I knew that person would say it.
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mermaid2499
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like NYC lol
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mary rosenblum
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Oh yes...that is pretty
distinct. :-)
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mary rosenblum
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And not just for the way the
words are pronounced but also for the rhythm of the words and the world
view that's expressed.
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mary rosenblum
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Remember that you're not just
concerned with HOW a character speaks, but also what world view those words
express.
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mary rosenblum
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It will be yours if you don't
consciously think about it.
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mummsy
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is it necessary to use single
quotes around an oddly spelled word or phrase?
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mary rosenblum
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Not if the character uses it
as normal speech.
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mary rosenblum
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Those enclosures make the word
stand out.
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mary rosenblum
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If this is a character's
normal word, there is no need to pick it out in any way.
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mary rosenblum
|
This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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tory
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Rhythm? do you mean long vs
short words? And how do you show fast or slow speakers?
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mary rosenblum
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Listen to how people talk.
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mary rosenblum
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Some people drag things out,
punctuating their sentences with 'you know', 'ah', 'uh' or those other
'thinking pauses'
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mary rosenblum
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Others talk very fast, you
know what I mean, there's just no time, none at all, and I really don't
know why I'm standing around here talking to you, so I'd better get going.
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mary rosenblum
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You can change that rhythm by
breaking that up and give it a totally different feel.
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mary rosenblum
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Others talk very fast. You
know what I mean. There's no time. None at all. I don't know why I'm
standing here. Talking to you. I'd better get going.
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mary rosenblum
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Others talk vaery fast. Oh,
you know what I mean, like all the time. They kinda act like they've got no
time, you know? None at all. They're like bouncing up and done, like they
don't know why they're even talking to ya. It's like they can't wait to
just take off, like, and get going.
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mary rosenblum
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All pretty much the same
monologue. Three very different rhythms, three different voices.
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mary rosenblum
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That's rhythm.
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mary rosenblum
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And I have to imagine a very
different character for each of those voices.
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mary rosenblum
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Your character voice conveys
the character to the reader more powerfully than any other technique you
can use.
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mary rosenblum
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So if your voice is
featureless...your characterization is going to be weak, no matter what you
have your character do, or what words you put into his/her mouth.
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mary rosenblum
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That's why a lot of novice
writers have trouble with characterization.
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mary rosenblum
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We learn nothing from their
voices.
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mary rosenblum
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And in real life, that is how
you evaluate a stranger.
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mary rosenblum
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Generally, you hear them
speak...that's your first impression, along with visual image.
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mummsy
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i had an editor return a short
story begging me not to use them anymore
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mary rosenblum
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Oh, I'm sorry, mumsy. I'd say
that you probably were sending them stories that they don't publish...
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mary rosenblum
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so there was no point in you
wasting your postage.
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mary rosenblum
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New writers often misinterpret
guidelines.
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mary rosenblum
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They're all pretty general.
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mary rosenblum
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This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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mummsy
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question was out of sequence
mary, they told me not to use single quotes anymore
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mary rosenblum
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Oh, whew!
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mary rosenblum
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Sometimes, posts take a long
time to show up on my screen.
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mary rosenblum
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Yeah, those single quote marks
are only used very occasionally and generally in dialogue if your speaker
wants to make a word stand out.
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mary rosenblum
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They distract the reader.
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mary rosenblum
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Which brings us to the issue
of phonetic spelling and reader migraines. :-)
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mummsy
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should you mention that a voice
is, for example, raspy? to get the idea across?
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mary rosenblum
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You're better off to just
bring that raspy voice to the reader's attention and then remind 'em
occasionally, mummsy...
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mary rosenblum
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it's the same problem as with
dialect...
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mary rosenblum
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if you try to spell stuff
phonetically, you get in the way of your story.
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mary rosenblum
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"Who're you?" the
old man rasped in his whiskey voice. "Someone I know?"
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mary rosenblum
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And you might occasionally use
'he rasped' or have him hack and cough now and again...
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mary rosenblum
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to remind us of the sound of
his voice, but leave it up to the reader to remember and 'hear' the correct
tone.
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mummsy
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seems to be a fine line
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mary rosenblum
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Everything in writing is a
fine line, mummsy.
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mary rosenblum
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too much is not good. Too
little is not good.
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mary rosenblum
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You're learning to walk a
tightrope as you write.
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mummsy
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but sometimes crossing it is
fun, when it works
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mary rosenblum
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Hey, balancing on it is
fun...when it works! LOL
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mary rosenblum
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Character voices DO need to be
unique and if your character has a strong regional or foreign accent...
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mary rosenblum
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you DO need to make your
readers hear it, and that does require phonetic spelling and perhaps quite
a few foreign words.
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mary rosenblum
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Orson Scott Card taught us a
good method at Clarion that I've used successfully...
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mary rosenblum
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and that is to concentrate on
the dialect or accent for a short stretch.
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mary rosenblum
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Go ahead and spell everything
phonetically. Use a lot of foreign words. Make your reader work, but give
them a strong sense of the character voice...
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mary rosenblum
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and then back off. Maintain
the rhythm and syntax of that voice, but use only the occasional...
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mary rosenblum
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phonetic spelling to remind
the reader of the voice...or the occasional foreign word.
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mermaid2499
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like grill'd chedda not my way
of saying grilled cheese
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mary rosenblum
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Yeah.
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mary rosenblum
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And once you're gone through
that 'immersion' section where you spell out the sound of the character's
words...then..
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mary rosenblum
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you can just drop in the
occasional grill'd chedda and we'll keep on hearing that accent.
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tarsus
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If a character has a long drawl,
how do you indicate this, I mean without saying ...he drawled?
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mary rosenblum
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YOu know, tarsus, saying 'he drawled'
is generally less intrusive than phonetically spelling out a long drawl.
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mary rosenblum
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Or you could spell out that
long drawl for a paragraph or two and then, from then on, just remind us
once in awhile, 'he drawled'.
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mary rosenblum
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This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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mary rosenblum
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If you want a prime example of
what NOT to do, I suggest you read Brian Jacques Rosewall books.
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mary rosenblum
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Now I love his books, and
I"m not normally fond of anthropomorphic animal stories, but he does a
great job.
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mary rosenblum
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BUT...he has these moles.
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mary rosenblum
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And they speak with a thick
cockney accent.
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mary rosenblum
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And he does every single awful
word in phonetic spelling with a swarm of ' ' '
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mary rosenblum
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and you have to stop and
figure out how to say the words and THEN figure out what the moles are
saying ...
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mary rosenblum
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and it does slow the story
down to a crawl.
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mary rosenblum
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I've heard MANY complaints
about the moles from readers over the years.
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mary rosenblum
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Did it keep his books from
being bestsellers? No.
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mary rosenblum
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But if ALL of his characters
had talked that way, I suspect they would not have been as popular as they
are.
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mummsy
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so there are no hard and fast
rules
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mary rosenblum
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The Do, please, use your
private message feature to chat during the forums. It gets hard to read for
those people with slow servers, if there is a lot of chat.
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mary rosenblum
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The only real rule is that the
story needs to work.
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mermaid2499
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Do the rules change depending on
genre
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mary rosenblum
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Well, when you get into the
literary/experimental end of things, authors play more with punctuation.
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mary rosenblum
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Cormac McCarthy's All the
Pretty Horses uses a lot of spanish with no attempt to help the reader
figure out the conversation through context.
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mary rosenblum
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He also leaves out the
quotation marks. :-)
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mary rosenblum
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But the amount of phonetic spelling
and/or foreign words you use is pretty much a subjective matter of balance.
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tory
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Mary you mentioned listening to
tapes of a foreign language to catch rhythm. Would you still get rhythm
from tapes that are to TEACH the language. Are there long enough sections
of foreign narrative to catch the rhythm or do you need say books on tape
something in that language?
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mary rosenblum
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Mostly it's a matter of
getting an understanding of how the sentences go together.
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mary rosenblum
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For example in chinese, there
are no tenses.
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mary rosenblum
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I go to the store now.
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mary rosenblum
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I go to the store at four
o'clock.
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mary rosenblum
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I go to the store yesterday.
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mary rosenblum
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I don't think anybody but
English uses contractions.
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mary rosenblum
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Do, please, use your private
message feature to chat during the forums. It gets hard to read for those
people with slow servers, if there is a lot of chat.
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mary rosenblum
|
This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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mary rosenblum
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And you can use actual
conversations, Tory, as long as the context is pretty clear.
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mary rosenblum
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If your character enters a
room and someone greets him or her in another language...
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mary rosenblum
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and that person bows, say, and
responds...
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mary rosenblum
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99% of your readers will
assume that is a greeting.
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mary rosenblum
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If your character asks in
Portuguese, 'pass me the bread please' and your POV passes her the bread
basket...
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mary rosenblum
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no problem.
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mary rosenblum
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BUT if your characters discuss
their plans to murder the innkeeper in Romani and then go off to do other
things...
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mary rosenblum
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your readers missed it.
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mary rosenblum
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If your POV is going to speak
another language quite often in your book, it's not really a good idea...
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mary rosenblum
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to make that voice too stilted
or 'different'...
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mary rosenblum
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since you want your readers to
focus on what is going on rather than how things are said.
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mary rosenblum
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Simply dropping all
contractions from your sentences will make them sound just a bit
'different'...
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mary rosenblum
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without distracting the reader
from what is being said.
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mary rosenblum
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Don't worry about the language
when you're working on the first draft.
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mary rosenblum
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That's something to fine tune
when you're working on revisions.
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mary rosenblum
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And then get feedback from
your readers.
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mary rosenblum
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It's always a good idea to
give your readers specific questions to answer AFTER they read your ms.
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mary rosenblum
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Readers don't necessarily know
what you're concerned about when they give you feedback.
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mary rosenblum
|
This is the Tuesday Forum with
me Mary Rosenblum LR Web Editor, fiction and nonfiction writer. We're
talking about dialect in dialogue. If you're new here, remember that you
need to click on the Ask a Question button or the word bubble next to the
red question mark at the top of the screen, or use the ask a question icon
in order to ask a question. Your regular send bar won't reach me! You can
also type /ask in front of your question in your regular send bar to reach
me.
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mary rosenblum
|
And of course, one way to get
around the 'translation' issue is to have a character who does not speak
the language...
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mary rosenblum
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who can demand translations.
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mary rosenblum
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But you really do not have to
learn the language in order to use it in a story or book.
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mary rosenblum
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Although it is a good idea to
either search for a language website or buy a simple conversational phrase
book...
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mary rosenblum
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so that you get a sense of how
the language sounds and the way the words are arranged.
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mary rosenblum
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But even more important than
foreign language or dialect...each character should sound different.
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mary rosenblum
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That can be harder than giving
a character a strong accent.
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mary rosenblum
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You really do need to get to
the point where you 'hear' your character's voice all the time.
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mary rosenblum
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I actually do carry on mental
(or out loud when nobody is around) conversations with my characters...
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mary rosenblum
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quite a lot before I start
writing...
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mary rosenblum
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so that the character's voice
comes to me automatically when I write his/her dialogue lines.
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mary rosenblum
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And as I said earlier in the
forum...
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mary rosenblum
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carbon copy character voices
are one of the most common..if not THE most common...novice writer
problems.
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mary rosenblum
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Ideally, you should be able to
remove every tag line from your story (tag line = Jane said) and...
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mary rosenblum
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still know who is talking.
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mary rosenblum
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You know, if you have a long
commute to work, that's a great time to practice dialogue. :-)
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mary rosenblum
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I do that while driving quite
a bit.
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mary rosenblum
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If nothing else, drivers will
see you talking to yourself and decide that maybe they should give you LOTS
of space. :-)
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mermaid2499
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Should we take out the tag lines
and see if we can tell
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mary rosenblum
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Yes, mermaid! That's an
EXCELLENT exercise.
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mary rosenblum
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I have students at workshops
do it at times.
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mary rosenblum
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I used to do it a lot when I
was first writing...just to see if my dialogue was distinct.
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mary rosenblum
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Often it was not.
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mary rosenblum
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It takes practice to evolve
distinct voices easily.
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mary rosenblum
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It's work when you first start
out.
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mary rosenblum
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But character = voice.
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mary rosenblum
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If the voice is you, so is the
character, no matter what trappings you give that person.
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mermaid2499
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Do actions make it easier to
avoid the tag lines
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mary rosenblum
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Yes, mermaid. I really
encourage action tags whenever possible.
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mary rosenblum
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You simply avoid 'said' and
all those other 'saidisms'.
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mary rosenblum
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"I
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mary rosenblum
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"I'll be there in a
second." Judith grabbed her coat and scribbled a note for Kathy.
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mary rosenblum
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Who said 'I'll be there in a
second'?
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mary rosenblum
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And no 'said' is needed.
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jackie7777
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Totally off the subject - Forum
topic - how do you choose your characters natiionality, race and creed? I
am working on a novel. I do not have a race in mind. When I started writing
- they had no color. Race is important - I know. But it will change the entire
dynamic of my story.
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mary rosenblum
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Oh, that's a great question,
Jackie, and does kind of fit since we're talking about language/dialect
here.
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mary rosenblum
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Nationality matters. Race
matters. Economic status matters.
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mary rosenblum
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And they all change how your
character will interact with the story.
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mary rosenblum
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I think about it. I play
'leggo' with my character...what if she's Chinese?
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mary rosenblum
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What if he's black?
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mary rosenblum
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Gay?
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mary rosenblum
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What if she's Hispanic?
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mary rosenblum
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I think about what issues each
change adds to the story...
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mary rosenblum
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how it complicates the plot
I've come up with...
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mary rosenblum
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and what new conflicts it
raises.
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mary rosenblum
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Then I decide what's going to
work best for this particular story.
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jackie7777
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I want the story to focus around
the story line not the people.
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mary rosenblum
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Well, Jackie, plot and
character and setting are integral parts of story.
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mary rosenblum
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You really can't leave any of
those three 'story legs' blank without harming your final story.
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mary rosenblum
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Some stories are highly plot
driven...but even they need real characters in order to work.
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mary rosenblum
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Cardboard figures really don't
give you something that is strong enough to catch an editor's eye.
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mary rosenblum
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Believe me, a lot of work goes
into a story that isn't evident on the printed page!
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jackie7777
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I mean I want my readers to see
the story - not because they were a certain color but because the story was
so impelling.
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mary rosenblum
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Well, sure. Race is only going
to be an issue in your story if you make it an issue.
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mary rosenblum
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If your character happens to
be African American or a Latina and it's not an issue in the plot, it won't
be an issue...it'll just be part of this character's background.
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mary rosenblum
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In many of my stories, the
ethnic background, religion, or what have you, is simply part of who this
character is...
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mary rosenblum
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it plays no major role in the
plot...
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mary rosenblum
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but of course, it does affect
that character's world view...just as economic background, childhood,
education...
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mary rosenblum
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and the like affect that
character's world view.
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mary rosenblum
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To step up onto a soapbox for
just a moment here...
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mary rosenblum
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the slush piles are full of
stories whose characters are all middle class, caucasian Americans.
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mary rosenblum
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Editors really do love it when
you give your characters a bit of diversity.
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mary rosenblum
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It does add to characters..
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mary rosenblum
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if they are different.
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tory
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Mary, also way off topic:
Regarding word count. I've seen many novels that have a short quote at the
beginning of each chapter. Are those counted in the word count even though
they are not the author's words?
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mary rosenblum
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Word count in novels really
doesn't matter except in terms of general length.
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mary rosenblum
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You don't get paid by the
word...
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mary rosenblum
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and the real issue is number
of pages...
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mary rosenblum
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because that affects the cover
price of the book.
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mary rosenblum
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So if a market says they want
70-80,000 word drafts...
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mary rosenblum
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they want a certain number of
pages in the book.
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mary rosenblum
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If your quotes bump your page
count over their limit, they'll ask you to reduce the words.
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tory
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A contest I'm entering is very
specific about word count, and I don't know if I should or should not count
them. Guess I'll write them. :-)
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mary rosenblum
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You'd better.
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mary rosenblum
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Either that, or edit out
enough words so that it fits their word limit.
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mary rosenblum
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You can edit out a LOT of
words in a novel ms! And never miss one of them!!!
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mary rosenblum
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Oh...cool...fedex just arrived
with my bookmarks for the new novel...
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mary rosenblum
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They look great! I'm very
pleased.
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mary rosenblum
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Well, this has been a fun
Oregon Hour
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mary rosenblum
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Whether you use dialect,
foreign languages, or slang, make each character sound unique and you'll
stand out in the slush pile.
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mummsy
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what's it called mary?
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mary rosenblum
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The book? Horizons. You can
see the cover up on amazon.com, although it won't be out until November.
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beryl
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This session has moved me out of
my (ho-hum) comfort zone. Thank you so much, Mary.
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mary rosenblum
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Oooh, good! I'm always pleased
when something works. :-)
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mary rosenblum
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Thanks for coming all!
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mary rosenblum
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I'll post the transcript in
the usual place...
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mary rosenblum
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Writing Craft: Forum
Transcripts.
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mary rosenblum
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Thanks for coming all!
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mary rosenblum
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Join us tomorrow, same time,
for our casual chat...
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mary rosenblum
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when we get to gether to talk
about...anything. :-)
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mary rosenblum
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Have a great day!
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mary rosenblum
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Nice to know that the
'armament' seems to work, anyway.
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