hello all,
I wonder if anybody has any experience of writing a novel in say English that is set in France (or indeed any other non-English-speaking country). I want to be able to convey authentic dialogue when it is spoken by French characters but should I write all or perhaps just short pieces of dialogue in the French language; and if not, how can I deal with dialogue when it is spoken by French characters but needs to be read by English speakers.
Elsie Byron: what Creative Writing Course did you do. I think of doing another course myself but there are so, so many. Was it any good?
Hi Colin. I asked this same question in my creative writing class several years ago. I was told to write all conversation in English but to impress on the reader the character was speaking another language. The tutor said when you write a sentence where the character is speaking use words that describe this. e.g. 'He answered me with a deep, broken French accent that was hard to understand.' Or drop a short question/answer from the character that is written in French but not a full sentence. Hope this is some help, good luck.
I used a few short Portuguese phrases in my first story to convey one of the English MC's incomprehension, originally, and also had him say a couple of words in the language to make a point to a Portuguese non-English speaker. But I also had the character repeat the words, or their basic premise, in English, so they were fairly easily understood.
These very short phrases were criticised by an HNS reviewer as 'mostly incorrect', so I'd get a fluent linguist to check them before you go to print, which is what I did for story 2.
I'm not certain you would get away with long foreign language passages though I suppose it depends to a degree on your audience.
Best of luck :)