Accents in books

[velcrokidneyz]

Lately I have been reading The Casual Vacancy, great novel in my opinion, but this is not a book review. My question to you my fellow escapists is do you have difficulty reading a character in an accent other than your own?

I am American and I know what British accents sound like but I have difficulty reading the dialogue in anything other than my plain mid-western accent unless it is written phonetically, such as "'Oo's there? etc. If i try to hard then I concentrate to much on the accent and cannot comprehend what I am reading so I have to re-read the passage again but in a normal accent.

I also ran into this issue when reading another series of books called then Dave Ronbicheaux series where the protagonist is a detective from Louisiana and I can't read his dialogue in my head in a Louisiana accent.

Follow up question, does this decrease the enjoyment of the story if you are not reading it as intended? I do not believe so.

Just a random question to pop into my head when reading.

 

[Wadders]

I like it, personally. Phonetic spelling always helps remind me what a characters supposed to sound like, otherwise I just read them with a neutral English accent, unless the author specifically tells me what they sound like.

It's especially fun with Scottish accents, there's so much opportunity for great phonetic spellings and dialect words too. I suppose some accents are easier than others to convey in writing, but I'd love to see a proper attempt at some of the other thicker accents, like a Black Country or scouse.

 

[KarmaTheAlligator]

I don't recall giving people accent unless it's very clearly said that they have heavy accents (through a description, or the way their speech is written), at which point I'll give them one/read the part with one in mind.

And if a piece of dialogue is intended to have accents, a (good) author will make you aware of it, though I doubt I've ever missed on anything by not giving characters accents.

 

[shootthebandit]

Dont read trainspotting you wont understand a word. Im scottish and i cant understand some words when they are written down but i speak them

 

[Queen Michael]

I'm Swedish, so I have no default accent. That helps.

 

[The Sanctifier]

I'm usually not particularly conscious of the accents when I read a book unless the words themselves have a local affection. Such as 'ere instead of here. It depends a bit on how fast I'm reading though.

 

[Dangit2019]

I have watched enough BBC to get a pseudo-English accent down, so that's usually how I read stuff like Douglas Adams and Yahtzee's books.

I find joy in reading books out loud in different voice. I don't have any discernable talent for it, but I like to think it helps me improve my own voice to be less monotone.

 

[Wyvern65]

I'm dyslexic, so I tend to get frustrated with any book that takes the phonetic spelling route. I can and have read them, but it's just a lot more work. Also, I rarely actually vocalize speech inside my head while I'm reading in any 'voice.' It tends to go right from words to meaning if that makes any sense whatsoever.

And yeah, I agree there's no right way to read a book.

 

[BurningWyvern90]

I do tend to read in my (American) accent for everything, even books by British authors, unless it says specifically the type of accent. Part of that's because for a lot of books I don't generally know what nationality the author is, so unless it's something I know for a fact is foreign, then I just revert to American. If I know, then generally I try to read in an accent unless it significantly slows my reading down. Phonetic spellings usually are helpful...except for southern American accents. Maybe it's because I'm from West Virginia originally and can hear that accent in my sleep, but those phonetic guides actually make it WORSE.

There was also this one time I was rereading the sixth Harry Potter and my brain decided John Cleese was going to be reading to me. I couldn't make it stop even if I tried, either. It was one of the weirdest things I've ever experienced.

I think it adds to a story, but at the same time I don't think it takes anything away from the central plot if you don't do it.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

Unless I have a specific actor in my head to do a voice, characters default to sounding like Crispin Freeman. Weird.

 

[ATRAYA]

I'm a writer not a reader, so I don't know if I'm allowed in this conversation... but I'mma do it anyway.
Personally, I can't write an accented character without doing so phonetically. It helps me, as the writer, get into the character's head. If I introduce the character early in the story and explain that he has, for example, an English accent, I may forget that little fact when the character returns two chapters later. But if I do things phonetically, then the next time I bring the character up I will remember to write his speech differently right away. This way I can also skip that part of his introduction all together and just SHOW he has an English accent through his dialogue. It's harder in literature, but the rule still applies - show, don't tell.

 

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

I'm an american, and I read The Time Traveler with a slightly british accent in my head.
It just depends on the background to the book I swish around in my head.

 

[Kyrdra]

As a non native speaker who reads english books: DON'T DO IT. I have seen books which have entire pages not readible for me because they are written in a scottish accent or something like that. I mean I can understand those people if they are talking but when you with go the phonetical way of writing it down it takes me always at least 3 times stronger to extract sense out of your writing.
hell even in my native language I hate it. If you have to read the whole thing out loud to get a sense out of it then the writer has failed in my opinion.

 

[velcrokidneyz]

There was also this one time I was rereading the sixth Harry Potter and my brain decided John Cleese was going to be reading to me. I couldn't make it stop even if I tried, either. It was one of the weirdest things I've ever experienced.

That one made me laugh

I definitely would not mind having that happen. Also books on tape, never tried them but it just seems the lazy way out and I have a tendency to want to re-read a sentence or two if it is striking or I can't believe what I read so that would get frustrating. Keep derailing but anywhoooooo....

 

[doggy go 7]

I definitely don't consciously thin about what accents people have, and if I'm hearing anything in my head at all, it's generally just in my own voice (including the girls). Unless there's phonetic writing, in which case I'm likely to slightly miss what they said the first time, and have to re-read it.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

I give characters regional accents... I don't mean to, it just happens, and will usually fit with their personality!

Also a lot of characters end up scottish. I think this is fallout from reading too much Iain Banks when I was younger, where all the characters are scottish, and some of the dialect is written phonetically to their accent... it sometimes ends up like a Bobby Burns poem[footnote]Wee, sleekit, cowran, tim'rous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murd'ring pattle!

[/footnote]!


Also, because I watch a lot of movies I also hear American accents in my head pretty well.

Narration is in my accent though!

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

I have different levels of reading. Generally I don't bother with accents in my head unless it's phonetically written, but sometimes I like to reconstruct a scene completely and then I give it a go. But for regular reading I'm not worried about them.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Unless words are spelled out phonetically, we generally tend to read dialogue in our own accents. Even for characters we know are (for example) Russian, Aussie or whatever, if their dialogue is written in normal English, we would usually read it as such. There's a trick for this that most authors use.

Short of writing everything phonetically, which is extremely cumbersome for both writer and reader, what they do is write the first few words the way the character would speak, but the rest is written in more or less correct English. And surprisingly it works. You are transparently reminded of their accent and begin reading it as such, and continue for the rest of their line(s) without consciously thinking about it.

The other trick, is if the character has a regular word or phrase they use regularly that we as the readers associate with them, something distinctive in their native accent/language. Note the following as examples.

"Niet tovarisch, it is not that way" said Sergei.
"Streuth mate, are ya sure I can't change your mind?" asked Bruce.
"Ooohhh my God, that's like so totally awesome!" screeched Mindy.
"Merde merde merde!" swore Claude, "I cannot open it".

In the above examples, there's enough written to give you the reader enough such that when you read it, you are unconsciously reminded of their accents without having to decipher tons of butchered language. At the speed we generally read, it's so fast and invisible that it barely interrupts the flow of words, if at all. Trying to read an entire conversation written phonetically is a chore that few readers will put up with for long.