Young Writers Society

So, in my book Sons of courage, which I am posting here, I am eventually going to have characters from different countries meet up. This is medieval time. The character coming to the foreign land is about 17, although he is 14 when he starts.

I would like to know if anybody has any ideas on how he can communicate with them. I don't want this to slow down the book, and I also want it to be realistic. I thought he could learn the language on three-year trip, but I don't think that would be enough to for him to truly understand the language.

He has no interpreter or anything, and although I plan on him meeting someone who speaks the same language later on, for the first while he won't have anybody to help him. any suggestions?

TheMessenger wrote:So, in my book Sons of courage, which I am posting here, I am eventually going to have characters from different countries meet up. This is medieval time. The character coming to the foreign land is about 17, although he is 14 when he starts.

I would like to know if anybody has any ideas on how he can communicate with them. I don't want this to slow down the book, and I also want it to be realistic. I thought he could learn the language on three-year trip, but I don't think that would be enough to for him to truly understand the language.

He has no interpreter or anything, and although I plan on him meeting someone who speaks the same language later on, for the first while he won't have anybody to help him. any suggestions?

General rule is to introduce a translator to be the middle man or have it where they share a language they can communicate conveniently through. Awkward translation is only amusing for a while and breaks up pace needlessly. When is why all those books you read the character eventually runs into someone who can talk the same language, makes things easier.

The only way, really, is for him to have some kind of translator. Someone to be the middle man, as Zolen said. Or maybe, some kind of sign language between the people speaking, that everyone knows for the most part? Could he have some sort of dictionary that he creates as he learns words here and there, to help him translate things on his own?

However, three years is plenty long enough to understand a language. If you think about it, it takes about half a year to understand the basic of a language in school. I could master a language in three years easily.

I'm half awake so I don't even know if this makes sense, but I hope it helps a bit.

A real life example: When I moved to France, I couldn't speak French, one year later I could fluently speak the lingo. You'll always be learning new words, but you're mainly understandable after a year, I'd say, especially if you're fully immersed. I was in an International school, and most of my friends spoke English to me, but I still learnt pretty quickly.

1- Is it a well known trade route? If yes, there might be pidgin options available in major cities. There would also be plenty of people who speak both languages in major cities.

2- Are the people he's meeting frequent travellers? If yes, they should be able to speak multiple languages.

3- Body language and gestures. While these are by no means universal, you can eventually figure each other out.

Realistic =/= two groups being completely incomprehensible.

Well it sounds like he would have enough time to learn a language, but I plan on him running into trouble and losing his books. Now how far into the book that will be, I don't know. It sounds like he'll just have to learn as he goes.


@RoseyUnicorn, it's a route during the war, but yes it is common. I suppose there would be lots of languages on a ship like that.

All the others: Thanks for the answer. I guess I wasn't sure if three years was enough for him to understand everything going on, which he kind of needs to quickly.

Also, I have been writing everything in English up to this point for the reader's sake. But, when the person speaking English runs into the foreign people, should I write it in a foreign language at first, and then when he understands it fully, change back to just English?

I wouldn't write it out in a foreign language. Instead just say he doesn't understand and their body language.

If there's a war going on, are there any prisoners of war? How long has the war been? How many places settle in this town? If a lot of people are settling in the town to capitalize on serving soldiers, then people will be multilingual as good business sense.

The war is only in the country he is leaving. Well both country's are warring themselves from within.

So basically you're faced with two civil wars next to each other? And don't have any border disputes?

Oh no, think of them as Britain and Japan. He is leaving from Britain going to Japan.

Next question then! How many people have traveled to that country from the other country?

Not many people. Only a few, including a king who returned from the country and wrote the translation books.

How literate is the population/how widely read are these books?

Uh . . . I hadn't thought about it too much. I would say that few have read the transation books.

So what about pronunciation? Would they have had people to practice on? Would anybody be teaching how to pronounce the words? How is the pronunciation guide in the translation books? If it's written with the assumption that those reading the books will speak the character's language, then the pronunciation guide will focus on the secondary language. If the books are written for the population he's going to, then the pronunciation will focus on the character's language (but if people don't hear the language, they're likely to get it wrong).

Edit- Also, how open was trade before the war happened? Did the two countries trade a lot, or do they leave each other alone? Another thing to keep in mind is that countries can and do trade during civil wars, because they don't necessarily have all the resources to produce war goods for themselves. Would this be the case here, or no? (This did legitimately happen in medieval times. Most "European" customs were actually imported from around the world. These include: coffee, tea, pyjamas, gunpowder, apples, potatoes, jalapeno peppers, chocolate, anaesthetic/surgery, physics, astrological navigation, the concept of 0, saffron, quite a few dyes, multiple types of perfume, even certain styles of dress such as the tall cone shaped hats women wore)

Edit 2- I reread things. Were the books distributed in the country the character is going through, at all?