Writing Toby Farrier has caused me to rethink many things not the least of is the way we talk today. I guess any novel sets the time and place by the words that the characters use and Toby has thrown up the occasional challenge as I don't spend a lot of time with people of his age.
Maybe I should get out more, I have plenty of contact with those either side of their teens but with Toby I'm having a bit of trouble with dialogue used by the modern teenager. If it wasn't so hot today I'd park myself on a bench at McDonald's or one of our many other fast food outlets and scam some of their dialogue with some selective eavesdropping.
Writing tends to make you question everything we do and say. Sometimes when words like AWESOME, EPIC and LIKE outnumber the nouns in a sentence I realise our language is a changing thing and I need a different approach. Just trying to understand today's young people speak made me think about the way we speak within in our different groups. Often for the same people this will vary and the use of swearing is demonstrative of this.
Among a rough group of mates out fishing or hunting I will find myself swearing along with the other members. Believe me we can fill the day with profanities that would make a shearer blush. IN another instance I might be with the very same people at a seminar or similar and we are all contained or restrained in our speech, demonstrating to those around us that butter wouldn't melt in our mouths.
There lies my conundrum I need to picture time, place and people as I write dialogue. Not easy but can be done.
Hang on McDonald's do ice-cream and I can justify it with research. Now where are those
keys to the air conditioned car.
Hi Terry, you might find the following interesting - taken from an assignment I did last year:
ReplyDeleteThe local McDonalds restaurant sits to the side of the Western Highway where it slices through the town on the northern side to connect Victoria with the western states of South and West Australia. It serves as a food stop for those who leave Melbourne at sunrise, hoping to reach Adelaide by evening. On any morning tourists sit side by side with locals in the restaurant, although it's rare to see any interaction between the two, one intent on eating and running, the other taking a more leisurely approach to their meal. On this day, a young couple sit discussing their welfare payments, to the amusement of other diners who eat in silence.
‘They’re bloody unbelievable, the bastards, cutting my payments like that.’ The girl speaks with her mouth full, a piece of lettuce caught on her lip moving in time with her words. ‘What’m I s’posed to live on for the next fortnight – fresh bloody air?’
‘Why did’n ya speak up when you was there, then,’ her partner spoke between shovelling handfuls of his chips into his mouth, ‘too bloody late now to do anythin about it so you may’s well stop whinging about it.’
‘I was only sayin.’
‘Well don’t. Eat ya bloody burger and shut up. I’m sick of hearin about it.’
‘It’s a different matter when it happens to you though, isn’t it? It’s all we hear about for days.’
‘Shuddup.’
‘You shuddup.’
‘I’m tellin you to shuddup, so don’t start or you know what’ll come to you.’
She mutters something unintelligible and looks around. I have the sense she's trying to make eye contact with me in a bid for support. I look down and stare into my coffee.
‘Can I just say one thing?’
‘No!’
‘Why? No one stops you from sayin what ya want.’
‘Yer pushin it, you know that? I can talk because what I say makes sense. You can talk if ya wanna, but not about that.’
‘That’s big of ya.’ She says this as a joke, relaxing back in her seat and smiling at him, relief smoothing her features.
‘I’m big all right.’
‘There’s no need to talk dirty.’ She chides him, but I can tell by the tone of her voice and the way she smirks at him that she's enjoying the banter.
‘That’s not talkin dirty. You’ve got a filthy mind you have.’
‘I know what you meant.’
‘That’s the trouble with ya, Babe, you think you know everything and that’s where you come unstuck every time. Even with Centrelink. If you’d kept your mouth shut about us bein together, they wouldn’ve known nothin.’
‘Thought we weren’t supposed to talk about that.’
‘I can, you can’t.’
‘Jeez, I may as well be back in gaol. Talk about control.’
‘You love it. That’s why yer with me, so’s I can look after ya, and I can’t look after ya if you keep shootin yer big mouth off.’
‘Bloody hell.’
’Stop yer swearin. People are lookin at you.’
‘Shuddup.’
I lower my eyes again, looking down at the tray as I place the wrappers on it to put in the bin. I can still hear them as I walk out the door.
‘Shuddup.’
‘No, you shuddup.’
Thanks for the insight, maybe when I need some Centrelink help I can just go to McDonald's. It seems takeaway isn't the only thing we can get there.
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