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I am Lucille and P posted a story here last night. Its up. Its about a man being forcibly feminized in the 16th century on the orders of Queen Mary Tudor. I wrote it and I think its pretty good. But, then a question came to mind. The Dialog, how they spoke. I know my story was set in England in 1550s.
Wasn't their English vastly different than our own now? I know it was, if we could go back to then and try to talk to someone in 1550 London, would they even know what we were saying?
If I wanted to write the Dialog between the characters more like a English man would speak in the time, How would I do it? How would I find out how they spoke then?
Shakespeare
Shakespeare's plays were written only a little after this time and would give you an idea of how people spoke. And yes, barring a bit of accent, we could understand them and they could understand us.
Maybe you could write all the dialog in iambic pentameter? :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
You can brush up by reading
You can brush up by reading authors of the time period, maybe as late as Shakespeare, that should give you an idea of how the language they used.
Canterbury Tales
Canterbury Tales is a bit older but freely downloadable. You will find the English almost unreadable. My advice is not to try for accuracy.
That makes sense
If I did try to write the Dialog accurately for the time then people now may not understand what was being said.
Makes sense
I totally agree with this. Unless you're writing for history nuts or reenactors, if you write in ancient styles nobody will read it. Take a look at the japanese manga and anime for example. They have lots of stories with settings far in the past, even modern people travelling to the far distant past, yet despite the time gap, readers can understand them easily. The only two peculiarity which add character to these kinds of stories are lone characters who speak in a very archaic way of speaking and certain old fashioned, no longer used words that is foreign to modern society. Mostly it was done for the gag factor.
My advice is, write how you want it, in a way people can understand, instead of going for absolute accuracy. Unless you're going for a diary entry or a script for some period movie, accuracy is not necessary. It's a waste of time anyway. I believe the series 'The Tudors' (with that gorgeous English king and beautiful Anne Boleyn) didn't even use Tudor-style English.
The language I understood
That Will used in his plays was very formal and from a bygone age. It would be considered very stilted and artistically cumbersome. It might be the same difference from reading Little Women verses For whom the bell tolls. Hemingway was noted as the first writer , from America , who wrote like the people spoke. How did people speak then ???? my guess is the common man would speak more of a pigeon, or creo English speckled by terms used in the region at that time. opposed to the formal court English spoken by the high born. William's writing straddled between being flowery but also filled with shortcut words which were hold overs of a past times. Terms I need a cheat sheet to read
Huggles
Michele
With those with open eyes the world reads like a book
Unless you're prepared
to spend a long time researching the language of the period, in which case you'll probably have forgotten what the storyline was, I wouldn't bother. Make some sort of disclaimer that in order to make it more readable, you've written it in modern English, just be careful of using too many anachronisms.
I wrote a story based in the C9th using a sort of pseudo old language which I think gave it a flavour without being unreadable.
http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/fiction/8976/brenhines-arianrhod
It might give you an idea of how you might do it. Beware of too many prithees and gadzooks.
Angharad
Fuck
In those times. Fuck would be more likely than gadzooks.
An excellent question. It's
An excellent question. It's like asking how the Founding Fathers spoke. Did they speak in English or American accents? No one knows.
Bill Bryson has tackled this subject in his very readable 'Mother Tongue' (1990). He discusses amongst other things the 'great vowel shift' that took place around the time of Chaucer, when the East Midlands dialect pushed its way into a society where French was still the preferred language in royal circles.
As for writing period fiction, there is nothing to be gained from trying to reproduce anything like authentic dialogue. Even if it was scholarly correct, it would simply confuse most readers. The best you can hope for is not to include obvious anachronisms.
Periodicity
As many others have said here, the answer to your question really lies in research.
Another factor is to always remember, not JUST your story, but your audience as well. The purpose of a story is to entertain an audience. If you make it incomprehensible to them, then your purpose is defeated. Use a few 'olde' words to set the scene, but keep it mostly in your audience's vernacular.
The popular television series 'Blackadder' had a season set at around the same time, maybe watch a few episodes - easily found via Google. It was Blackadder II. Or, in other words, Blackadder 2.
Another way to invoke the period is to do some research upon the fashions prevalent then (they did NOT have skirts and blouses, so to have a character wear these is to destroy the 'atmosphere') and use those appropriate words to convey what characters are wearing - for instance, farthingales; or maybe doublets, ruffs etc. etc. etc. - this will add to your 'atmosphere'.
See - http://resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/homework/tudor... (a simple junior school homework project that gives enormous amounts of information)
By taking the time to prepare a story, then the more authentic a 'feel' it would have.
One author here, a while ago, posted a story and boasted of having done it in under 3 hours. It showed. With spelling and grammar mistakes in every paragraph, and using wrong references (for instance, letting her tale say that a 1951 Bordeaux wine (which she didn't even spell properly) was an expensive wine that could be kept for years and years and years - when the reality is that 1951 was generally acknowledged to be one of the worst ever vintages in the Bordeaux area) so it ALWAYS pays to take time, research thoroughly and reread it over and over again.
That at least is my two pennyworth.
I hope it was helpful.
Julia