Young Writers Society

Okay, as some of you know, I’m attempting to write a new novel. If you didn’t, now you do. Well, I want one of my characters to be mute. As in, someone cut off/out her tongue. Yeah, I know, gross. My questions are:

a) How much of that tongue does one need to talk?

b) What is one to eat when one has no tongue. Or half of it.

c) Any other needed information.


Of course, I can simply make someone cast a spell on her, but this seems much more… interesting? Lol

-elein

P.S. Come on, I really need help.

Well, I don't think one could talk at all without most of their tongue. I imagine they could eat alright, they'd just have to do it a bit differently. But I don't really know much about tongues, so I could be wrong.

It would be difficult for someone to eat or drink with no tongue - they'd have to be careful they didn't swallow too quickly and choke themselves. They might end up choking to death(?)

I don't know anything about cutting off toungues, but if you want to read a story about it, the myth Tereus, Procne, and Philomela is about, and many other strange things, someone getting their tongue cut out. It's from (the version I read) The Metamorphoses by Ovid but I'm sure if you googled either the title above or simply, "Philomela" (she was the one to loose her tongue) you might find something.

Also, I'm not sure this site would have anything on the subject but www.webmd.com is amazing for health related things, and they might have information about it. Or, have you tried en.wikipedia.org? G'luck!

I searched around a bit, and I could not find any real information, but I can say that if you cover the scene in which her tongue is actually cut off, remember that it is going to bleed like she's trying to start a flood. Copious will not begin to describe the amount of blood involved.

At the beginning of "The Lions of Al-Rassan" by Guy Gavriel Kay, there's quite a lot of information contained within the story about a character who has had his tongue cut out learning to speak again. That might help you a bit.

I'm pretty sure the person could eat and drink, albeit they'd do it a little more slowly. It depends on how much disability you want your character to have. The more tongue is cut out, the harder it would be for them to eat and drink, possibly impossible if it's too much, though I'm not sure. On the other hand, if the person has, say, half a tongue, they could probably still communicate some what, i.e. saying c's, m's, things like that. I read a book once where the main character had his tongue cut out, though it was set in the middle ages. I don't know when yours is set, but it's an interesting read. "King's Shadow" is the name, I don't remember the author.

PS by the way, if you're book is in modern times, there are machines to help the speech impaired (my mom's a special ed teacher) and they actually do the speaking for the person, but I don't know if it would fit.

Anyway, I hope this helps!!