Character Voice
I saw a spot on the Today Show one morning from the Broadway production of Legally Blonde the musical. By the time the song ended I was surprised I didn’t find blood dripping from my ears. There is no possible way I could have sat through an entire production of the show listening to that nasal twang sing. Could the singer project her voice? Yes. Did she display good voice control? Absolutely. Is she talented? Certainly. For all I know, I am in the minority in my inability to hear her voice for sustained periods.
I read a book that was so steeped with uneducated, southern characters whose dialogue was painfully true to the culture that I actually stopped reading the book. Same reason I stopped reading Lord of the Rings (I know, WHAT!?!), it was just way more work to slog through than I want in a book.
When you write a character with a lisp, the dialogue should dithplay the lithp when you firtht introduth the character but ath the reader gets used to it, you can back off a bit and only remind the reader every onthe and a while. Otherwithe ath you can thee, thith would drive you NUTTH theven chapterth in.
But the issue of voice in children’s literature is an interesting one. I recently received the comment that a character of mine didn’t ‘sound’ her age. I realize I might be biased but I had to respectfully disagree-at least for now. I feel I know a lot of kids and have done some good qualifying research. There is definitely a ‘voice’ you hear with certain ages. My daughter is (mostly)* a typical 10-year-old girl. I’ve heard interviews with 10-year-old girls from England that sound just like my daughter. It is so entertaining to see a kid make the same dramatic hand gestures, make the same head bobs and say the same things except with an accent. Yet my daughter has a friend that is very mature and serious for her age. She doesn’t fit in that '10-year-old box.'
My character intentionally doesn’t fit into her age box either because she is Einstein-smart and painfully prissy. She hangs out with a math geek and a computer nerd, so they aren’t going to be completely age appropriate either, though they are a bit more so. Their fourth friend is the only one who could be age appropriate but she hangs out with a bunch of brainiacs, so what is that gonna do to her?
Voice.
This is just one person telling me my character doesn’t feel age appropriate and I’ve considered the input and come to the conclusion that I don’t agree. However, if that became a common complaint, I’d have to address it and figure out a different way to show my mc’s smarts while keeping her age appropriate. I hope I don’t have to because I dig her the way she is.
It can be hard identifying a character’s voice. It can be even more difficult staying true to it. But your character is a person with quirks, habits, foibles and issues and it is your duty to discover what those are and exploit them when appropriate.
Go forth and discover what the voices in your head are trying to say. Those voices belong to your soundless characters. Soundless not voiceless. You are their only outlet.
