Fantasy Dialogue

[InzeladunMaster]

What is up with the stilted dialogue found in so many fantasy novels? Here is an example from a book I recently read:

"I will make Fenola ready to travel then, and I will take up your spare bow and wait. I am not the half bowman you are, but perhaps I can shoot well enough to cover your escape if I must."

I think this bit of dialgue would have been better written as: "I'll get Fenola ready, then I will wait here. Give me your extra bow. I'm not as good as you, but I think I can cover your escape."

Is it just standard form these days not to allow contractions in fantasy dialogue or use realistic speech patterns?

 

[thormagni]

What is up with the stilted dialogue found in so many fantasy novels? Here is an example from a book I recently read:

"I will make Fenola ready to travel then, and I will take up your spare bow and wait. I am not the half bowman you are, but perhaps I can shoot well enough to cover your escape if I must."

I think this bit of dialgue would have been better written as: "I'll get Fenola ready, then I will wait here. Give me your extra bow. I'm not as good as you, but I think I can cover your escape."

Is it just standard form these days not to allow contractions in fantasy dialogue or use realistic speech patterns?

Well, it is difficult to give people a recognizable voice when you are writing. Maybe the author is trying to make that one character have a distinctive voice. Of course, if all the characters speak the same way, then it is self-defeating, obviously.

 

[InzeladunMaster]

Unfortunately, ALL the characters in this particular novel speak this way. I have seen this happen in several works of fantasy in recent years (note, if you will, George Lucas' new Star Wars movies has this problem as well).

 

[Odovacar's Ghost]

"I will make Fenola ready to travel then, and I will take up your spare bow and wait. I am not the half bowman you are, but perhaps I can shoot well enough to cover your escape if I must."

Is this what word for word how the book reads? To me this is very difficult to read and understand.

I think this bit of dialgue would have been better written as: "I'll get Fenola ready, then I will wait here. Give me your extra bow. I'm not as good as you, but I think I can cover your escape."

This is much easier to read.

 

[thormagni]

Unfortunately, ALL the characters in this particular novel speak this way. I have seen this happen in several works of fantasy in recent years (note, if you will, George Lucas' new Star Wars movies has this problem as well).

I still maintain that for whatever misguided reason, George Lucas has decided that to sound suitably epic and operatic, his characters have to speak in stilted, stage-style, painfully bad dialogue. It HAS to be intentional. None of the actors are so bad that they would do this accidentally, or because of a lack of talent. I think he believes it sounds "grand" to have them speak that way. And since he is a billionaire movie mogul, he can get what he wants.

But look at the original trilogy. There are flashes of that sort of stilted dialogue in those, but Harrison Ford and Alec Guiness especially are able to overcome the style.

 

[InzeladunMaster]

Odavacar's Ghost: Unfortunately, the former is word-for-word, and, yes, I think it is much harder to read. When all the characters are speaking that sort of high-formal tone, it makes the book difficult to read.

At least that is what I think. On the other hand, virtually all fantasy novels being written these days seem to be written in that sort of tone, so someone must like it.

Thormagni: Do you think fantasy authors are adopting this tone to give a false sense of "epicness" to their stories?

 

[thormagni]

Thormagni: Do you think fantasy authors are adopting this tone to give a false sense of "epicness" to their stories?

In short, yes. Much like Stan Lee wrote the Mighty Thor comics in the high-falutin' fake Shakespearean style to show he was a god. They forget the cardinal rule of language, in that the people who speak a language don't realize they are sounding archaic or high-falutin'. To them, it just is the way they speak. It would only be to an outsider that the language sounds difficult or archaic. And unless everyone in the novel is an outsider, why would it sound so tinny to their ears?

It's like in the movie version of Hunt for Red October. When the Russians are talking back and forth to each other, why do they have fake Russian accents? If the language is already being translated into English for us to understand, why would they hear each other with fake Russian accents?

 

[chachi]

I feel that most genre fiction at its worst suffers from this kind of purple prose. It just so happens that you read a lot of fantasy. Romance novels are infamous for needlessly flowery descriptions and innuendos. Westerns have the same problems. Nobody says high-falutin' or varmint or injun anymore. It's archaic, but it is also a convenient way to connotate time and space without spending time working out background.

When a character speaks so wretchedly, I believe that the purpose is exactly what you are describing, to sound awkward. It saves the author from repeatedly telling you how different that these characters are from your everyday existence. It's the exact same reason that epic classical movies from Cleopatra to Gladiator end up speaking with British accents. It's ridiculous, but it is meant to convey a sense of formalilty, egalitarianism and old values, exactly what Britain means to Hollywood.

Tolkien did the same thing. Elves are much more formal that humans and hobbits. Gandalf speaks like he just fell out of Victorian England. Undoubtedly, some of it is tradition among writers also. Some people just take it way over the top, and it ends up distracting and keeps you away from the story.