STANLEY TROLLIP

Writing a Non-English-Speaking Character

STANLEY TROLLIP is a retired professor of educational psychology. He spent his professional life in the United States and now splits his time between Minneapolis and South Africa, where he was born. He is one half of the writing team known as Michael Stanley. He and writing partner Michael Sears wrote several mystery short stories and three novels set in southern Africa.Their latest novel is Death of the Mantis.

 

 

The Detective Kubu series is set in a southern African country, Botswana. Kubu is a detective in the Criminal Investigation Department of the Botswana police. His home tongue is Setswana, but he is a good English speaker; he was schooled in English, the official language of Botswana.

Kubu interacts with his colleagues as well as other Batswana (citizens of Botswana) in Setswana. In the line of duty he talks to people whose mother tongues include English, German, Afrikaans, and other languages. He makes a weekly visit to his parents, who are quite old and formal. So how does one capture these differences in the way characters speak?

It makes no sense to have two people speaking in Setswana for English-speaking readers. Obviously readers wouldn’t understand anything. So when a conversation is in Setswana, we do one of two things. The first is to say that the person is speaking Setswana:

“When is the ambulance going to arrive?” he asked in Setswana.

 

This is effective, but not colorful. So we also use:

 

“Dumela, rra. When is the ambulance going to arrive?” he asked.

Dumela is the Setswana word for “hello,” and rra is Setswana for “sir.” Even though their meaning is usually obvious from the context, we put words like these in a glossary at the back of our books, so we don’t have to explain them in the text.

After we have introduced the fact that the conversation is in Setswana, we write the rest in the normal conversational English of the area. The way an American would say something, for example, may well be different from the way an Australian would say it. Or an Englishman. In southern Africa, English speakers often use words derived from Afrikaans or one of the indigenous languages, so it makes sense to have our characters use them as well.

For example, in southern Africa, a pickup is almost always referred to as a bakkie, which is actually an Afrikaans word. So we use that word in conversation. Similarly, instead of enjoying a barbecue, people enjoy a braaivleis or braai. Translated literally, braaivleis means “cooked meat” in Afrikaans. Wherever possible, without detracting from the flow of the story, we incorporate these words to ensure that readers know they are reading about a foreign country. For example:

“Get onto the back of the bakkie,” Andries instructed the five boys. “Oom Piet is having a braai this afternoon. Make sure you leave some meat for the grown-ups.”

Here, the words bakkie and braai give the piece local flavor. The word oom (literally “uncle” in Afrikaans) has a more generic meaning. It is the way Afrikaners refer to people they respect. In this example, Oom Piet is probably just a neighboring farmer, not an uncle of the boys. In real life, if I meet an Afrikaans-speaking man older than I, I may well call him Oom as a mark of respect, even if I’d never met him before.

The comment about the meat helps to give context to the word braai. This piece also captures one other cultural aspect of life in southern Africa. Everywhere you go, on farms, in the countryside, and in cities, people are transported in the back of pickups (bakkies). It is part of the culture, even though it is illegal.

One can use the same device of incorporating specific words to differentiate characters, which helps readers to know who is talking without having too many he saids. For example, the forensic pathologist in our books, Ian MacGregor, is an immigrant from Scotland. Here is an excerpt from A Carrion Death:

As Kubu was leaving, the pathologist walked in, obviously recently showered.

“Did you just get back?” Kubu asked.

“About half an hour ago. I had to have a wee Scotch to calm my nerves. You are a rascal leaving me with that maniac driver, Andries. He insisted on driving the police Land Rover!” His accent had thickened noticeably. “He was verra upset with you, bossing him around like that. And he took it out on me and the rangers.”

It is obvious from the words he uses that the pathologist is Scottish.

If speakers who are not good at a language speak in that language, we try to show this by having their sentences broken and ungrammatical. In the following extract from our third novel, Death of the Mantis, Ndoli is a Setswana speaker and the Bushman knows only a smattering of Setswana.

Ndoli turned to the Bushman. “When you find?” he asked slowly in Setswana.

“Soon.” The man shrugged.

“Move him?”

The man shook his head. “Give water.”

We reveal the formality of Kubu’s elderly parents through their language and actions. This is how Wilmon, Kubu’s father, greets them every time Kubu and his wife come to visit.

Kubu walked up to his parents and greeted them, “Dumela, rra. Dumela, mma.” He then extended his right arm to his father, touching it with his left hand as a mark of respect.

Wilmon responded solemnly: “Dumela, my son.”

“I have arrived,” Kubu said formally. “And I apologize for being late.”

“You are welcome in my house. How are you, my son?”

“I am well, Father. How are you and Mother?”

“We are also fine, my son.” Wilmon’s voice was strong, but quiet.

Touching your right arm with your left hand as you shake hands or give or take an object is a mark of respect among the Batswana. Wilmon’s words are also formal and a little stiff, and we show this formality by never using contractions in his speech.

The final area of conversation that you need to pay attention to relates to the normal places and things people talk about, such as food, politics, religion, and sport. Ensure that you don’t have your characters talking about things that people in that area wouldn’t be discussing. Obvious examples would be having a Frenchman talking about baseball (unless he had spent a lot of time in the USA), or someone from Mexico discussing cricket, or a Norwegian eating curries. These anomalies may happen in real life, but always remember you are trying to make your readers believe in the characters.

EXERCISE

1. Choose a culture different from your own. It can be from another country or from within your own, such as the Navajo culture or Latin culture if you live in the United States. Spend half an hour or so researching that culture on the Internet: language, beliefs, traditions, location, and so forth.

Then write a conversation between two native speakers from that culture in such a way that readers would be able to differentiate the conversation from dialogue between two native English speakers. You want your readers to feel they are experiencing the culture.

2. Invent a character who is a white English-speaking American. Have him or her briefly describe a car accident.

Now have a Mexican immigrant describe it—in reality the conversation would be in Spanish, but your book is written in English.

Finally, have a European tourist (English, French, Italian, or German) describe it—here they would be speaking their version of English. Try not to make your characters into caricatures.