Parla Inglese?

[blamebrampton]

frantic_mice  pushed me in the direction of fanficrants  (which I can see lasting another week on my watch list, if that). One of the more interesting of the many rants was from someone who, in essence, said 'Look, we live in a globalised age, is it really the case that reading American spellings in a fic set in the UK and vice-versa is worth making that much of a fuss about?'

And I have to agree. I can easily overlook gotten and alright if  no one over the age of 20 cries and if people only talk about their deepest feelings when they are in extremis. But for some, including a long list of commenters, there are certain Americanisms that are like a dictionary to the 43rd President of the USA and have them running at first sight.

I can somewhat sympathise, because I can find it very hard to read when characters start acting American, talking at great length about their emotions and so on. While I adore my American friends, my closest ones know that they will receive one brief hug on meeting and departure, and I will probably never tell them any of my deepest feelings. Which is not because I don't love them, but because deepest feelings are only for personal perusal so that no innocent souls will become aware of the full extent of my inner lunacy.

But for spelling and so on ... well, I regularly read books and magazines published in America and sometimes set in the UK or elsewhere in the English speaking world, and I cope with them. In fact, the YA novel I just finished changed spellings depending on whether scenes were set in New York or Sydney and it read as very very odd indeed (though it's a good novel). Dealing with such spelling anomalies is commonplace: most of you do the same.

I do like a good Britpick for things like truck/lorry, stall/cubicle, Christmas eggnog/three bottles of decent whisky and hiding in the stables, and were I writing fic set in the US, I would make certain that my characters said Dude and asked for the check. However, my authorial voice would still sound like me, which I believe is appropriate. Wodehouse and Conan Doyle both have long sections of novels (Psmith, Journalist and The Valley of Fear respectively) set in the US where they follow this rule, and these were great successes on both sides of the Atlantic.

All of which is my lengthy way of saying, I can cope perfectly well if you're an American and you write alright, color and aluminum. But if you could hold off on having the lads say 'I love you so much, sweetie, that sometimes I just want to cry'*, I would take it as a personal favour.
 

Finally, HAPPY BIRTHDAY suonguyen !


*If you have actually written a fic that contains this line, obviously it worked well in the incredibly clever context you created for it.

Comments

[beatnikspinster.livejournal.com]

As an emotionally repressed Earthling, I also cringe at explicit emoting for the fact of it, not the cultural incongruity. I understand not wanting to hear long emotional exchanges.

Aside from that, spelling is easier than cultural issues. I do my best with my spellings and grammar. My beta britpicks the spellings and terms. I do the best I can at moving the dialog into the proper zone. Sometimes it works better than others. But, and this is the kicker, I know the effort's pointless.

The cultural part will never be convincing. I'm not British. Never been to Britain. Never even been an Anglophile. And I've always said that I speak American, not English. I translate the best I can. But I can colour and lorry and MI5 my comic until the cows come home, and it will always fail if the standard for success is "must seem created by British person". I mean...I make comics. No medium is more inherently American than a freakin' comic. I have my Brit-picking done, research costumes and environmental visuals, and try to make the story work. That's all I can do, and it won't be enough. I already know that.

So, what to do? I get that HP is a British product, and this is a expressed cultural ownership bonding thing. I guess ya gotta do whatcha gotta do. Maybe I should add "Artist/Author is American" to my warnings in non-American-origin fandoms. Anyone sensitive to having their cultural products reinterpreted by Americans would have some warning.

[frantic-mice.livejournal.com]

Anyone sensitive to having their cultural products reinterpreted by Americans would have some warning.


I LOLed. <3 :DDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Heee! Funnily enough, your characters act quite British a lot of the time. I don't think that faux Brit is the desired end point (it would lose so much of the vigour, wit and emotional depth of American writers for a start), just not obviously American.

I suppose, to reach for a dreadful analogy from popular culture, I'm talking about the difference in Buffy between Spike's English accent and Angel's Irish accent. You know that the actor playing Spike isn't English, but he sounds as though he's sat down and tried to think about what goes into the voice and mannerisms and then melded them with his own style to create something that is quite compelling and certainly not overly off-putting. While David Boreanaz's Irish accent makes me burst out in fits of giggles every time.

[beatnikspinster.livejournal.com]

Ahhhh! Now I see. That was the perfect metaphor! Yes, David Boreanaz's accents are things of hilarity and terror. *shudders at memory like war vet* James Marsters and Juliet Landau were so much better. Those flashback scenes of the three of them made him stand out even more.

Funnily enough, your characters act quite British a lot of the time.

It's interesting in terms of emotional reserve. That was part of my upbringing. Protestant farmers in Kentucky and Tennessee tend to cover any overwhelming emotions with discussions of vegetable gardening and minor medical problems. Except my aunt, who collects daily news stories on bizarre murders. :D