: Modernized dialogue in fantasy - stylistically untrue or clever genre subversion? I find myself using words like "kiddo", "bullshit" and "badass" in the more comedic side of dialogue/thoughts in

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The language used in your story is supposed to communicate with your intended audience. As an example, in Fritz Lieber’s stories of the Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, the author often used modern elements in his similes of action events — the severed head rolled down the street like a bowling bowl. It was never period descriptions, but given his audience in the pulp rag he published in, it was appropriate.

In your case, assuming your are not doing a portal story as has been described, you should use whatever vernacular you feel communicates the qualities and personalities of your characters to your intended audience.

It would be odd, and require explanation, if your POV characters were all kiddo and badass but the rest of the characters were speaking in Elizabethan prose or Shakespearian dialogue.

Not that all your characters have to speak the same way, we humies have always created and freely used language very liberally, often with short hand and vulgar terminology.

Its only important that the character’s dialogue seems appropriate for the scene they are in. If this kiddo slinger is talking informally and speaking in a vulgar and common manner, then there should be other characters speaking similarly at some time in the story. If your world has like formal speech — The King’s English or equivalent — and has a common tongue used by everyday people, then it would natural to expect that common tongue to be filled with slang, crudity, and pop-culture references to their times.

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