Help Please! phonetic or not

[K.J. Simmill]

Hi all, I hope you are well and having a good weekend.

I have a question and I could use your personal and expert opinion as both writers and readers.

In my second book, I have a character who uses the occasional old English word, for example elþéodigu, now I cant decide whether or not, since it only occurs in speech, to keep the thorn symbol or substitute it with the phonetic th

"You dare waste our food on those elþéodigu."
vs
"You dare waste our food on those elthéodigu."

It is a case of accuracy vs ease of reading, since the language itself isn't used for sentences etc, I am leaning towards the second option, and I would guess most readers wouldn't associate it with being an old language thus I imagine I get a little but of leeway there.

What would be your preference?

 

[Karen Gray]

I'd say phonetic if you are using non standard characters, helps the reader hear how to say it.

 

[Emurelda]

Yes I agree with Karen. Phonetics will keep the flow of reading going otherwise it's going to jar your readers at the symbol.

 

[Karen Gray]

I would also recommend that you have a glossary x

 

[Alistair Roberts]

Phonetic 'th' is easier for the reader as they say.

 

[K.J. Simmill]

Thanks, I thought it was nicer as the the but wanted to lean on the wisdom of my peers

 

[Brian Clegg]

I agree, though I wish we still had thorn, like they do in Iceland. (The country, not the frozen food shop.)

 

[Nicole Wilson]

Agree - I have Russian swear words in my manuscript and I was given the advice to use the phonetic version, not the Cyrillic alphabet. Same for here. Your reader wants to sound it out in their heads.

 

[Karen Gray]

Agree - I have Russian swear words in my manuscript and I was given the advice to use the phonetic version, not the Cyrillic alphabet. Same for here. Your reader wants to sound it out in their heads.

I have Japanese in book 3 and some Russian words in book 2 also, I used phonetic Russian and romanji (phonetic japanese)

 

[Bernard Stacey]

Hi all, I hope you are well and having a good weekend.

I have a question and I could use your personal and expert opinion as both writers and readers.

In my second book, I have a character who uses the occasional old English word, for example elþéodigu, now I cant decide whether or not, since it only occurs in speech, to keep the thorn symbol or substitute it with the phonetic th

"You dare waste our food on those elþéodigu."
vs
"You dare waste our food on those elthéodigu."

It is a case of accuracy vs ease of reading, since the language itself isn't used for sentences etc, I am leaning towards the second option, and I would guess most readers wouldn't associate it with being an old language thus I imagine I get a little but of leeway there.

What would be your preference?

Personally I don't think it matters as whenever I see this sort of word salad that look like the author fell asleep on the keyboard, I tend to remember it more like a pattern than a real word.
Of course it could one of those weird Irish words and it's actually pronounced 'pancake'.

 

[Karen Gray]

Personally I don't think it matters as whenever I see this sort of word salad that look like the author fell asleep on the keyboard, I tend to remember it more like a pattern than a real word.
Of course it could one of those weird Irish words and it's actually pronounced 'pancake'.

Don't you think that rather than personal preference here, we have to be aware of the readership and wider readership, if you don't want to put some of them off then phonetic is the way to go. However if you have a die hard fanbase who won't be put off by this kind of thing, then go with personal preference

 

[Bernard Stacey]

I couldn't say. Probably in certain genres there will be entire squadrons of people who are fluent in Elvish, or who read Beowulf in the original Anglo-Saxon without batting an eye and therefore care about this but, boringly, I write in (modern) English only so don't have these issues. Hence 'personally'...

 

[Karen Gray]

I couldn't say. Probably in certain genres there will be entire squadrons of people who are fluent in Elvish, or who read Beowulf in the original Anglo-Saxon without batting an eye and therefore care about this but, boringly, I write in (modern) English only so don't have these issues. Hence 'personally'...

Haha yeah! And em what's that one... I wanna say Dalek but that's coz I'm a whovian... the trekkie one.... Clingon!

 

[Jennifer Stone]

Shouldn't it be spelt 'fonetiklee'? Lol
@Karen Gray you could always try Gallifreyan

 

[Karen Gray]

FON-E-TIC-ALLY actually... but close

 

[K.J. Simmill]

Thanks everyone, I always think it best to get a second opinion, although I must say I am really happy the phonetic was the preference
Thanks again. Have a great week

 

[Alistair Roberts]

FONE ET IC LEE I'd have thought??

 

[Karen Gray]

Not a clue really, apparently there is a space between every syllable so technically we are both wrong and it should be FO-NE-TI-KA-LAY lol!

 

[Jennifer Stone]

Not a clue really, apparently there is a space between every syllable so technically we are both wrong and it should be FO-NE-TI-KA-LAY lol!

CAKE!! For sake of argument.

 

[Karen Gray]

CAKE!! For sake of argument.

Mmmmmm! Yes please!

 

[K.J. Simmill]

mmmmm, can I have a cookie too?

 

[Karen Gray]

I just nearly burned the house down making toast this morning (not a common occurrence) Perhaps I should leave the oven to someone else?

 

[Jason Byrne]

Hi all, I hope you are well and having a good weekend.

I have a question and I could use your personal and expert opinion as both writers and readers.

In my second book, I have a character who uses the occasional old English word, for example elþéodigu, now I cant decide whether or not, since it only occurs in speech, to keep the thorn symbol or substitute it with the phonetic th

"You dare waste our food on those elþéodigu."
vs
"You dare waste our food on those elthéodigu."

It is a case of accuracy vs ease of reading, since the language itself isn't used for sentences etc, I am leaning towards the second option, and I would guess most readers wouldn't associate it with being an old language thus I imagine I get a little but of leeway there.

What would be your preference?

I'll be the one voice arguing for elþéodigu — especially if you can get away with doing it both ways, between two speakers.
"You dare waste our food on those elþéodigu."
"What the hell does elthéodigu mean?"

I have San click lanuage which I render with click consonants, and try to explain them as they come,
"À tsí gǂà’î kxà !’hà. Mí à ho !hú !hán!a’à tsí."

I also render Turkish with its own letters,
"Biz Bizans komşuları ile arkadaş olmak gerekir, Sunduk."

And I have a letter written in Cyrillic Bulgarian, with a phonetic reading in the dialogue later,
"Добрите мъже на стената охрана Баба Вида,"
"Dobrite muzhe na stenata okhrana Baba Vida,"

I do the same thing with Arabic,
محمد رسول الله
Muhammad rashul Allah