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Poorly written accents
Posted on: Sat, 12/18/2010 - 18:26
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Poorly written accents
From "The Weapon (Revised)":
"Oh, 'ey are coming along beautifully. I 'ave only 'ot two or t'ree more t'ings to arrange and it will be wonderful. Bill has been such a 'elp, you know." Fleur took over, kissing Bill on the cheek before turning toward the table again. "We have the best idea for the table cloths, t'ey will be brilliant-"
Okay, now, really. REALLY! I enjoyed this story. I really did. But this has got to be the worst French accent I've ever seen attempted... I left a review for the author, suggesting that they avoid writing the accent and merely describe the sound of Fleur's voice before moving on. You know, the sensuous buzz of her consonants, the careless eroticism of her Gallic lilt, something. The response that I got, paraphrased, was that the writer was doing the same thing Rowling did. I was flummoxed.
"Oh, zey are coming along beautifully. I 'ave only two or three more things to arrange and it will be merveilleux. Bill 'as been so 'elpful, you know." .... "We 'ave ze best idea for ze table cloths - zey will be brilliant-"
Maybe? I personally love the substitution of a soft "z" for "th". But one can go too far.
Any other favorites?
Comments
Is it bunging a 'z' into the text for 'th', or dropping a few 'h's, or is it the structure of the words? Because inserting the 'h's back into the paragraph above actually makes it sound like a bog-standard English speaker to me.
I can't help thinking that no-one would bother trying to mangle their text for an otherwise anodyne English speaker who has a squeaky voice, so why do it just because someone's "foreign"? While there's often a distinctive burr to accents, what really identifies it is the way they structure their sentances and the phrases they use. For example, the Germans, when they are speaking the English, for sure they will use certain forms of words (I'll stop that now) because it's difficult to stop the structure and verb arrangements from their natural language seeping into their English.
The same holds true for the various local accents in Britain. People don't just "sound funny", they use dialect words, local phrases, and other things which are what really differentiates them. I have an interesting take on all this, being a foreigner living in Britian - even as a native English speaker my accent stands out slightly in both places! But perhaps the best example of this is my family in rural Norfolk, some of whom are among the dwindling breed (Even in Norfolk) to have a proper old "Norfolk bor" accent. I remember introducing the lovely Ms. Rat (Canadian) to my uncle for the first time - he said the usual hello-nice-to-meet-you stuff and she looked at him like he was speaking Martian. As the man himself would put it, it were guinea a box!
I often think that many of the people attempting to write accented dialogue have quite simply never actually heard the original, and certainly not in its natural habitat. Bad accents? One word - Hagrid, by just about everyone, ever.
Just my £0.02!
Cheers,
The Rat
_______________________________
Standing here in my Reckless Hat
The Order of the Phoenix by Ruskbyte, who started many things and left many of them hanging...
"Aye," responded Moira, sarcastically, "We jus' mi'! Wha' i' bluddie Hades wuir ye thinkin'?"
Not sure what "mi'" refers to. TO;DR (Too oblique; didn't read)
Mi is might :)
We just might, what the bloody hell were you thinking!
:P
when one sees "mi" one thinks "mee", and in any event, why the bloody hell do we have to see it notated?!