At 10:37 PM 7/24/96 +0000, you wrote:

mgiroux@upc.qc.ca (Louis-Philippe Giroux) wrote:

Chapter 3: Awakening
< > means foreign language
* * means thoughts

I'm not against experimental writing, but I'd thought I'd comment on 
standard methods of including thoughts and foreign language in 
fiction.

Thoughts: There seems to be two ways of doing this.  One is to write 
it as a standard quote, but without the quotation marks:

    Kei's certainly in a bad mood today, thought Yuri.  I wonder 
    what's eating her?

Since this can be confusing if not done carefully, the other way is 
to put the thought in italics.  Since the standard way to imply 
italics in ASCII is to put asterisks in front and back, I guess using 
asterisks for thought isn't a bad idea.

        Try putting < thought > around a character's thoughts.  The arrows
are rarely used anywhere else so make acceptable thought delineations.

Foreign language: In my opinion, this doesn't need to be indicated.  
If someone is speaking in a foreign language, and the other 
characters understand it, it can be stated in the text that a foreign 
language is being used.  

    "You!  Identify yourself!"  The soldier spoke in Charn, a 
    northern dialect Jinne hadn't heard in ages.  Suddenly, she 
    realized where she was, and a feeling of dread washed over her.

If the other characters don't understand it, that's best conveyed to 
the reader by not actually quoting the line, so that the sense of 
confusion comes through.

    The soldier shouted angrily.  The words were gibberish to Jinne, 
    but the implication was obvious: wherever she was, she didn't 
    belong.  She smiled politely and backed away.

        Actually, either method can be used if the other characters don't
understand.
As the message being conveyed is often relevant to the story, let the
reader understand the speech but make it clear that such understanding is
not universal.  Try this:

     "You!  Identify yourself!"  The soldier spoke in Charn, a 
     northern dialect Jinne hadn't heard in ages.  To Jinne, the words 
     were gibberish but the implication was obvious: wherever she was, 
     she didn't belong.  She smiled politely and backed away.

Comments?

------RM

Greg Sandborn	(aka: Uncle Fester)

Home on the range at:	sandborn@microlink.net
			sandborn@burnsmcd.com


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Pushing the envelope of fan fiction till my stamp gets canceled.