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SassyLil'Thunderstorm

Topic: Where does character personality meet bad grammar?

That’s something that I always keep in the back of my mind. I always see people say they hate bad grammar, (not that I fear the 'grammar police' or anything) but do you consider that to be bad grammar? It may reflect character personalities depending on how much detail you want to come across. Someone writers may have characters that use slang or characters that speak English as a second language and may not speak well. You may even want to reflect someone being pretentious with their intelligence and add a bunch of random large words to their speaking parts.

Basically i'm just asking for opinions, does anyone do this in their stories. I was re-reading my Harry Potter books(i'm a big kid lol) and thought it was interesting how certain characters (Hagrid, Fleur, Ron, Percy, Stan from the Knight bus etc.) have their own personal ways of speaking that are horrible but add so much to their characters.

#1 Nov 27th 2006, 7:14pm . Edited Nov 27th 2006, 7:16pm

Royal Bliss

Most people mean the grammar beyond the dialect of the characters. If a character speaks a certain way it's totally understandble. Dialogue can be sentence fragments while just writing cannot be.

Yeah I have a few characters that use slang. I like slang. And one character has a stutter so sometimes when his dialogue comes up I make it as if he's trying to avoid a certain word because he knows he'll stutter when saying it, common for most people with that.

#2 Nov 27th 2006, 8:35pm

dbz 77

Have you ever read Forrest Gump? That book has a lot of spelling and grammatical mistakes.

#3 Nov 27th 2006, 9:42pm

SassyLil'Thunderstorm

Nope, never saw the movie either. But I know what you mean, its one of those movies/books that are so talked about that you don't have to see it to feel like you actually saw it.

#4 Nov 27th 2006, 9:52pm

Lord-of-Fools

If it is within context, grammar mistakes are fun. This includes dialogue, things written from the first person perspective of someone who would most likely not have good grammar and spelling (such as the short story 'Flowers for Algernon' or 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time'). That is my opinion as a grammar (specifically punctuation) nut.

#5 Nov 28th 2006, 10:23pm . Edited Nov 28th 2006, 10:24pm

ONETRACKMlND

I do that alot. Whenever I do a multiple POV first person story (mouthful) I load it with a person's grammar. It helps the person (well me really) get into character. The grammatical mistakes add to the character of a character. I think that in third person, the grammar mistakes should only be made in dialouge or thought, but not in detail/ author input, but in first person, it should be used everywhere to get into character. They are fun when used like that.

#6 Dec 10th 2006, 5:19pm

Sakka-Fenikkusu

Agreed. In writing, we are trying to create an accurate, believeable world, and I think that characters should be able to have personalities in this kind of world. The way people speaks can reflect a lot about them, and editing that out for the sake of good grammar is surely folly.

#7 Dec 24th 2006, 5:06pm

Taltush/MeiMei

Well, sometimes specific characters speak a certain way, and yes, it IS fine to have them speak that way (shortenings and stuff). I can't think of any author who doesn't insert a bit of personality into their characters by having them speak differently. Now, sometimes the grammar mistakes are inaccurate, and that can be really annoying. Be consistent! Please!

#8 Dec 25th 2006, 9:28am

Elevator

Improper grammar and such are fine in dialogue (because let's face it: who uses proper grammar every time they speak?), but if improper grammar is persistant throughout a narrative, it gets really annoying. The only exception that I can think of is if a story is told through the first person viewpoint of a character that speaks a certain way that involves bad grammar.

For example, when I write dialogue for young children it often contains a lot of improper grammar because young children don't usually go around speaking perfectly.

#9 Jan 21st 2007, 7:58am

Lucretia Baine

I try to use grammar well in my narratives, but when a character speaks, I don't expect him or her to know that you say, "It was she" instead of "her." Yes, I actually put thought into that.

The Harry Potter example is great. Also, there are parts in which Ron talks with food in his mouth, so you really have to try to say it out loud in your mind to realize what he's saying.

Having to understand dialects makes the reader work a little harder, sure, but it gives the characters more of a voice. When Hagrid speaks in the books, I can imagine his voice like it is in the movies. It makes it more real.

#10 Feb 01st 2007, 7:27pm

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