I'm really struggling with the balance on this one. Instinct tells me to rationalise it wherever possible, but it's not easy with Geordie, because so many of the words themselves are different.

Normally, say with Cockney, I'd just choose a couple of idioms that suggest the speaker's accent and write the rest in plain English. But if I try that in Geordie it looks misrepresentative.

Classic example is 'don't know.' In Geordie this is 'divvent knaa.' If I put 'divvent know' it looks ridiculous, but is 'divvent knaa' distracting? And how many readers won't have a clue what it means?

Similarly hissel for himself, yous for you plural; aad for old and on and on. I don't want it to look like an exercise in dialogue but I don't want to write with a cloth ear for how people actually speak in Newcastle.

Eeh its a bugger.

Here's a line of dialogue in dialect:

‘Aad witches. Divvent give a friggin toss. Aw, Brian, me locket. Eeh, Brian, me mam’s savings. Aye: we knaa where their hearts lie.’

Is that unreadable?

Um, to be honest I lost the sense of it half way through, and only understod the first half because of your earlier explanation.

That's useful, thanks N.

I had the same issue to contend with, using Cheshire dialect.

I think less is generally more in a finished book, but I found it helpful to write the dialect quite strongly in the first draft and then tone it down more and more with each edit. That way, I kept the speech rhythms of the original, even though I'd got rid of phonetic spellings etc.

I read once not to write in dialect as it really upsets readers, but to write in ordinary English and follow it with something like ... she said in her strong Geordie accent.

That way, readers know what it should be and can imagine it for themselves.

It's the sense of the words that is important to the reader, not the fact they are talking in a Geordie accent. Only Geordies would be conscious of it, and they are a very small percentage of the market. However, as others have pointed out, rhythum of the speech is very important, and I think you have a good rythum going there.

- NaomiM

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PS. I did understand it after a couple of read throughs, but wouldn't want to have to stop and do that in a book.

Caro that's brilliant advice - I can see how that would work. Thank you.

Katerina, that's interesting advice. I can't see how it would work for me, I suppose because it sounds like authorial intrusion/info dump. Like you're telling the reader how to interpret the words instead of the words doing that job. But it's a tricky balance.

Think I'll go with strong first draft, very toned down final draft.

Caro, I think that's brilliant advice too, thank you - I've never thought of it like that.

Emma

Aad witches. Divvent give a friggin toss. Aw, Brian, me locket. Eeh, Brian, me mam’s savings. Aye: we knaa where their hearts lie.

Yes, I do find that distracting, I'm afraid.

My suggestion is that you don't write ordinary words phonetically to represent the accent, but where the words actually differ use the Geordie words. So include the dialect but not the accent.

For instance, write divvent and mam because they are actually different words, but don't write knaa rather than know because it's just accent. Once you've got the rhythm and the key words (divvent, mam) in place will mean readers hear it in their heads as a Geordie accent without feeling they're deciphering something, as most teenagers feel with Shakespeare.

Deb

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Of course I don't really know what I'm talking about - that's just what I would try. Good luck working it out.

Well I'm a geordie and I found it an effort to wade through, and that was just one line. That's the problem with dialect - locals don't recognise the dialect on the page because they speak real words with a strong accent and never, ever write dialect, ie "divvent knaa" - so it comes as a surprise to the reader and is uncomfortable to read because you are learning new word formations, not skimming over familiar shapes of words you know, which means you have to read the letters to understand to the word, so your pace of reading slows right down. That's for those familiar with the phrase. I guess it's just gobbledegook to strangers.

The other problem with dialects is consistency; if you begin one character talking in a dialect, then ALL have follow suit if they have the same, unless you're making a point, and the reader is expected to learn the dialect almost as if they are learning a new language (used in sci fi and fantasy, esp. alien dialects).

I'm a big fan of Auf Weidersehen Pet, and although Oz has a very broad accent, he comes across almost MORE geordie than Dennis and Neville because his tone is particularly brash - almost offensively so. As if to imply the thicker the speaker, the harsher the dialect.

Just my two bob's worth

Colin, how would you write divvent knaa?

If you set stuff in the North East, what would you do with the dialogue?

I agree the spellings are very distracting. I've written one other story with dialect in and did I did as Deb suggested - only spelling the words that are different -the rest in normal English. But it looked terrible in print. "Divvent know." Weird.

how would you write divvent knaa?

I would write it don’t know.

I'm Northumbrian – I wouldn’t call myself Geordie as I'm not from the Newcastle area – and I've never said divvent knaa in my life. The North East is a huge area, and not everyone speaks the same way – although it might sound the same to outsiders

Personally, I wouldn’t write in dialect at all. Describe your characters well enough and readers will ‘hear’ their voices. But that just might be me – I absolutely hate reading dialect! Colin is right (and I've seen it on here before) – having to laboriously decipher dialect words when you know what they're supposed to sound like is bad enough; when you don’t know, it’s just about impossible.

Dee

This is kind of what everyone else has already said, but... I think (and it's very much a personal view) that conveying a regional accent/dialect - just as with conveying, say, a foreign accent - is mainly a matter of the rhythms and patterns of the speech, rather than by writing it all with lots of dialect words (which can make it less smooth to read) or words misspelled to indicate how they are being pronounced. People from the north-east (your example) speak in a very distinct rhythm, and I think I'd try as far as possibe to convey the sound and music of their speech through they way you put sentences together - with maybe the odd regional phrase or dialect word thrown in for colour and to remind the reader - but generally to use normal English words, spelled the normal way. I think less is more: the reader will pick up that they are from that part of the world and 'fill in' or 'hear' that accent for themselves rather than your having to put the words down phonetically on the page. And there's nothing wrong with mentioning, at the outset, your character's 'soft Geordie lilt' or whatever, to fix this in the reader's mind!

In Hearts and Minds, I have an Italian man, and most recently an Irish traveller couple in my latest book, and I've tried to convey the accent just with the patterns of their speech. I think the latter approach works much better. (I got really annoyed in Harry Potter having to read Fleur Delacour speaking 'like zees all ze time'!). But it's a very personal choice.

I also love the sound of Caro's idea of writing it more phonetically to start with and then gradually ironing it out to leave just the rhythms in place.

Rosy


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(Ooops - italics overload!)