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

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

I love you so much, sweetie, that sometimes I just want to cry'

LOL, that sounds like Draco in my earliest fics. In fact, when Harry proposes to him, they cry and hold each other. Ooh, I think I edited that out some time later. :D

I'm not going to link you to the fic I just read in which the Trio work at Home Depot.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

SNORT! I can just see that: 'I'd like some wood screws, thanks.'
'Sure, what are they for?'
'My wardrobe, the side is coming off.'
'Sounds as though you might have a Boggart in there. Would you like someone to come round and remove it?'

Do normal people cry when they are proposed to? I have ever made excuses and left ... in one case the country.

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

I was puzzled when I was proposed to - especially because G put the proposal in the form of a math problem that I was not able to solve. But in my fic Harry and Draco have just discovered to their relief that both are alive, and they're in a deeply emotional state. And then, after they stop crying, Harry makes shepherd's pie. And they have sex in the kitchen. All in all, a very believable sequence of events. :)

In the Home Depot fic, I believe they are going undercover to catch Death Eaters. It was the only thing Ron could think of and the others couldn't thing of anything else. And Ron says "“Oh…uh, my bad" and "Don't get so worked up about it."

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

I would absolutely have sex with someone who made me shepherd's pie after I'd been crying, you were wholly right there!

XXX BB

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

PS, I think you told me the maths problem proposal before. Your husband is a bit different ;-)

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

Oh yes... just a bit!

I am sure he will have some interesting ideas about child-rearing as well. I think he may be disappointed when he realizes that not all his children may be interested in math and computer science.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

I'm hoping one of the triplets grows up to be a Luddite stonemason. And only in part so that you will have lovely garden art ;-)

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

They will all be "unique" people, that's for sure. We will need to keep the Luddite away from our machines. My fantasy is that they will all be creative in some way. People who are not creative (most lawyers I've met, not you Shiv dear) seem to have no soul.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Knowing kids' propensity to rebel, one will be a gourmet butcher ...

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

That's what I keep telling Georg about the consequences of forbidding things. He does not want to celebrate secular Christmas, as both of us did with our families, and I have told him that if we ban Christmas, we will end up with a disturbed adult who wears those gaudy reindeer and jingle bell sweaters throughout December. (Which is how my mother ended up when her family wouldn't allow a Christmas tree, so I have proof).

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

You're quite right. I slept with a Conservative to annoy my mother.

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

I bet it worked, too! :)

[romaine24.livejournal.com]

Er, was this a brammers cracky comment about 3 or a fact? *gulp*

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

It's no joke... there are 3. :)

[romaine24.livejournal.com]

Wow, I totally missed knowing this. Did I miss making the filter?

Congrats and no wonder you were so sick the first few months. I hope you're feeling a bit better now.

Amazing, just amazing!

*major hugs*

[shiv5468.livejournal.com]

AHA!

I know lots of creative lawyers. English barristers are always doing Stuff

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

:D

Perhaps your American brethren tend to be duller types.

[shiv5468.livejournal.com]

Maybe. I don't know that solicitors tend to do much, but the quiet thoughtful end of both professions tend to be great readers and followers of art. And I know a lot of writers and painters amongst them.

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Calculus proposals FTW!

The kids will grow up solving math problems to find hidden Christmas presents?

X-D

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think that's likely. ;)

[vaysh11.livejournal.com]

... especially because G put the proposal in the form of a math problem that I was not able to solve.
This is priceless. Seriously, this makes my day :D.

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

It's absolutely true! I am not sure what motivated him to do such a thing. :)

[vaysh11.livejournal.com]

My inner nerd wants to know the math problem. Can you share it? Not the solution, just the problem!

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

I do not remember exactly - I have it in a file somewhere (this was 10 years ago). I believe it was a calculus problem, and I never got past geometry in school.

[norton-gale.livejournal.com]

UPDATE: G has reminded me it was actually a permutation, which is some type of algebra (that I never learned). :)