Dont Write Accents Phonetically

DON’T WRITE ACCENTS PHONETICALLY After the post from a couple weeks in the past I had promised to avoid politics for some timeâ€"if not endlesslyâ€"and I actually meant to stay to that, however then this came alongside, just this morning as I was reading Live and Let Die by Ian Fleming, and I simply couldn’t let it go by without remark. Going back some, at some point I realized I had never read any of the original James Bond novels and thought I must, so I found an old copy of Casino Royale, read it, and actually kinda dug it. It was all hopelessly dated, and retrograde particularly in terms of gender roles, however I was willing to chalk that up to the truth that it was written in the 50s, and it was fun enough that I determined to learn the rest of the sequence. But the second Bond book has stopped me cold. Though I recently (re)wrote in regards to the separation of creator and art and have written about the endemic racism in pulp fiction that primarily came to: Hey, this was, like, ninety years agoâ€"get pleasu re from it for what it is. But then I started studying Live and Let Die, which was first printed not in 1914 or 1924 but 1954, when it appears to me fiction should have at least started to meet up with the Civil Rights Movement and . . . I don’t know . . . this might sound arbitrary, as a result of admittedly it's, however I just bristled at the preliminary description of the African America villain Mr. Big, tried to consider it as “quaint,” but then obtained to Chapter 5, which is literally, truly entitled “Nigger Heaven,” and . . . proper? Seriously? Honestly, that’s simply it for me and Mr. Fleming. This chapter options James Bond and white CIA agent Leiter moving via Harlem, observing the people there exactly as one would probably harmful animals in their pure habitat, describing them in no more human terms than as if they have been animals encountered on a safari. And then we get Ian Fleming’s demented try and convey the sound of a Black American’s voice: “Aw honey,” the lady was anxious, “dey ain’t no use tryin’ tuh git mad at me. Ah carried out nuthen tuh give yuh recasion tuh ack dat way. Ah jist thunk you mebbe preshiate a ringside at da Par’dise ’nstead of settin’ hyah countin’ yo troubles . . .” . . . and it simply retains happening like that, with the couple being eavesdropped on there only to show off Fleming’s apparent contempt for the voice, and in no different means shifting the story ahead at all. Let’s be sincere, the chances of that phonetic factor ever coming across as anything however offensive is definitely somewhat slim. The subsequent best chance is that it is going to be hokey. Third most typical end result: confusing. See where I’m going with this? Don’t try to convey accentsâ€"nonetheless well-intentioned you might beâ€"phonetically. Please, simply don’t. â€"Philip Athans About Philip Athans It has been famous, sir!! So, what's the various to phonetic representations? Describe the accent? A quick note in an attribution? Word choice and the order of words within the sentence is the important thing… more than worthy of a publish all it’s own. I promise to write that up! But within the meantime… /2012/07/24/living-dialog/ I’m so very glad Zora Neale Hurston didn’t stay to read and take your advice. I’m prepared to confess that a (very) few authors have managed to tug it off, like Susanna Clarke, however it’s dangerous floor! Ditto to Kameron’s comment. What would you suggest as a method to cope with accents? Yes, I agree with earlier posters. This is rather well placed, however what's your advice? I feel like phonetics are okay in the reading, provided you don’t go too far. Your sample is a good showcase of how not to do it, but I guess the reader would forgive some phonetic re-spellings.