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Topic : Re: How to deal with a story that 95% of it takes place in a different language country and the protagonist speaks in it? The protagonist is from a certain country, and in some point of the - selfpublishingguru.com

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The answer would seem to be to remember the point of view of the narrator. If you are writing from the protagonists point of view, then write it from the language that the protagonist speaks. if (s)he goes into a shop and doesn't understand anything that is said, then say that they had to point at what they wanted etc

If later on the protagonist learns the word for banana, then you can include that development.

If the narrator has a different point of view, then describe / show what the protagonist is doing, there is no need to include language / speech in the story.

TV is a visual / audio experience, they need to have people speaking because it is near impossible to show what a character is thinking. A story can do that very easily though, you don't need to show the reader the conversation, just tell the story

As for changing the language, if I was reading a book where the character went to China and suddenly all dialogue was written in chinese, I'd feel pretty annoyed! Again it comes down to the point of view of the narration. If the narrator speaks that language then the narrator can translate for the reader. If the narrator doesn't understand what is being said, then neither should the reader.


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