Writing a dialogue in a foreign language

Pearl said:

In my novel, I will have a couple of dialogues that are supposed to be in a different language, notably French. I was told by someone that its best to write the entire dialogue in French so the reader would know that the conversation is not in English. I disagree and believe a few French words here and there is enough to indicate there is a foreign language going on. I think having an entire dialogue in a different language would alienate the reader. Correct?

Click to expand...

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

If you're writing in the 19th Century (but I don't think you are), you leave the words in French. If you're writing in this century (and you are), you either write in French and translate to English somehow, or you do as you're planning to do.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

I would be very wary about having more than a couple of lines in a language the reader (presumably) doesn't understand, it would be a real test of their patience. In a movie, sure, but it doesn't really work in prose.

If you want to readers to understand the dialogue, just write it in English and mention in the text that the characters are speaking French - its a perfectly acceptable use of translation convention. If it doesn't matter whether readers understand it or not, its really up to you whether its English or French... but if readers don't need to understand it, then you probably should put some thought into whether the dialogue is needed at all, or whether it would better to just have something like "(character) yelled in French" or whatever.

Personally, I don't like the idea of throwing in a few French words here and there, to me it seems to break the illusion of the translation convention (if they're speaking entirely in French, why are only some words being translated?). Stuff like "yes" and "hello" and "thank you", maybe, but I wouldn't go much further. That's just my opinion though, if you want to do that then go for it, but exercise some care. Don't rely entirely on that device to inform readers that the characters are speaking French either - if I was reading dialogue like that, I would just assume the characters are, well, speaking English with a few French words thrown in.

If you're going to do so, make sure you don't rely on any online translators to translate. Either know the language or find someone else who does know it. Online translators translate words, but not context and meaning. Just a word of advice on that.

When I use a foreign language in dialogue, I put the translation immediately after in italics. I haven't had any agents comment on it being a problem with them.

However I use foreign language sparingly.

I think it comes down to what the reader needs to know.

if the reader needs to know what's being said, write it in the language of the narrative. If they don't need to know, why are you writing an irrelevant dialogue? =)

A number of films and tv shows these days go the route of partial or even fully untranslated dialogue, but this tends to be for incidental or throwaway lines and characters. A couple of mooks shooting the breeze before the hero comes and punches them out, for example.

Avoid it as far as is possible.

All the reader needs to know is that the characters were speaking in their native language or French or Chinese or whatever. The dialogue doesn't have to be written in French or Chinese etc.,

It looks daft having any attribution or action tags in English and the spoken words in French or Japanese or...

Hm. If i understand your question correctly, you're saying that you would have an *entire* dialogue in english, with a few french words thrown in, but the narrator or POV person notes internally that the *entire* conversation is in french?

like:
Michel (POV person) listened in on the conversation. The two students spoke in French.
"Bonsoir, Danielle. Where's the party at?" asked Jean.
"It's at my house" said Danielle
"Ah, then I can come. Merci."

I think JSDR's solution is quite elegant. But I thought I'd share my experience as for the first time I had to write a great deal of my book with characters speaking a different language.

It was pretty straightforward really. I established at the beginning that whenever the character spoke and it was italicised that meant she was speaking a different language. What this did for me was allow for me to easily go back and forth between languages without having to explain every single time to the reader explicitly that that was what I was doing. So the first couple times, yes, I mentioned that it was a different language, just to introduce the concept and remind readers. But from then on all I had to do was italicise the conversations.

I should also point out that this is a book that is being published and I have just gone through my first round of edits with my editor and she totally supported the technique, just so you know that this way of working doesn't seem to bug publishers or anything if you were interested in it.

If the POV character can speak the language, then find a way to set it off if you use it extensively in the book, but I don't know about using a few french words in with english. It looks a little odd to me with both languages, unless the speakers are using both languages at the same time.

My take on it would be:
Pedro sat down at Starbucks. The couple next to him conversed in French. Slowly enough that he could understand what they said, even though he'd gotten a C in that class.
"[insert english translation here.]"

There is no set rule on this. But obviously you have to clue the reader in somehow on what's going on in the scene. If you can do that you have a lot of leeway. I italicize foreign dialect, but maybe not for long scenes where the characters aren't speaking any English at all. You could actually do a scene with French-speakers, you'd just have to use tricks to give us an indication of what they're talking about, use gestures and actions, etc.

I would only do something like that if it were for a specific purpose and I knew I could pull it off without alienating whomever is reading.

Another option is just to indicate they're talking in whatever language and go on in English, the equivalent of subtitles, I suppose. I've never been keen to include both languages (aka translate), because to me it always feels like too much.

In my case I have a manuscript where Cuban-Americans use broken English mixed with Spanish. The Spanish isn't translated but the English always gives it context.

Just some options, I'm sure there are other ways to handle it. I just feel subtlety and clarity, if possible, make something like this flow much more smoothly.

Pearl said:

I was told by someone that its best to write the entire dialogue in French so the reader would know that the conversation is not in English.

Click to expand...

Well . . . duh. Gee, I wouldn't notice at all that the dialogue was in French and not in English unless somebody told me so. Kind of like I wouldn't notice my Coors Light beer can wasn't cold if those damn mountains didn't turn blue.

I read French, but I don't need two pages of dialogue in French for me to get the idea that it's in French and not in English.

Your instincts are correct. A couple of simple lines, in italics, and some quick explication that the dialogue continues in French, but is rendered in English. Such has been done by many writers. Maybe an occasional word, greeting, or epithet, in French tossed in here or there. Just don't expect your intended reader to understand French.

caw

I've read two novels (Christopher Priest's The Separation and Adam Robert's Yellow Blue Tibia) where square brackets were used. In the Priest novel, any dialogue in German is bracketed. In the Roberts, most of the main characters are Russian, so the square brackets are used when characters talk in English.

"[It looks something like this,]" they said.

Correct.

The only time I can see that it matters whether I know the whole conversation is in French/Japanese or whatever or not is if a particular character's failure to comprehend what is being said in the conversation is important and relevant to the unfolding tale.

Pearl said:

Thanks for the advice, everyone.

So far, I am using basic words, like oui, bonsoir, merci and such, but leaving everything in English. I also mention that the entire conversation is in French.

Click to expand...

Don't write dialogue for a character speaking French in English but throwing in a few token French words. Either write it in French if the character listening is not supposed to understand what it means, or if the character listening is fluent, write it in English.

If the character is speaking English but English is their second language, you can indicate that by the grammar of the sentence or using some foreign greetings/terms of endearment:

"Enchante, monsieur. I hope we shall see each other again."

Or you could start the characters off speaking in French and then go into English once we've established that all their dialogue is in French.

Right or wrong, this is how I did it in a novel where most of the characters speak English but a few don't. The second language is also used when English-speaking characters are to be kept in the dark but not the reader.

"Sut i chi?" How are you?

As far as I know, sentences not in English should appear in italics.

If I'm wrong - it's too late.

You might try having a look at a book called Rock Paper Tiger. A lot of the dialogue is in Chinese, but it's written in English with the occasional Mandarin word or greeting left in the dialogue. Also, the narrator translates for the reader. For example: MC meets non-English speaker on a train.

MC: "Chinese greeting." Hey. What's up?
And then the rest of the conversation was written in English with the occasional Chinese word. Most of the Chinese that wasn't translated was bits of conversation the author had used before and translated several times, so that the reader already had an idea of what it meant.

Now, in this particular book, the only italics were when foreign languages were used in the narrative. I don't think there's necessarily a right or wrong way to format the text and I really doubt if an agent or publisher would turn a story down because you didn't have italics for the foreign language.

There's Donna Leon. She writes in English; her characters speak, usually, Italian. She uses a few Italian words for atmosphere.

But when a character speaks a different language--English, say, or Venetian--she simply says they are doing so. (Usually, there's a reason, which gives a hook to hang the language change on.)

A well-done example from our good friend Christopher Isherwood:

Round the walls were draped scarlet banners with white lettering: "Arbeiterfront gegen Fascismus und Krieg." ...

Click to expand...

Otto thumped me violently on the back in his delight. "Mensch! Der spricht prima, wahr?"

Click to expand...

Arthur coughed, shuffled his papers. Then he began to speak in his fluent, elaborate German a little too fast:

"Since the day on which the leaders of the allied governments saw fit..."

Click to expand...

"Good God, do you mean the bailiff?"

"I prefer the word Gerichtsvollziehr. It sounds much nicer."

Click to expand...

At least three different versions of the different examples people have been giving about foreign language, all within a page of one another.

This novel takes place in Berlin, so most people are obviously speaking German, but the dialogue is most often English for all the characters.

Just a little bit of citation to show you have a lot of options and you don't have to stick to just one.