: Re: Referring to people in a book I'm writing a book (travelogue) about Japan, comparing it to Sweden, where I'm from. During my travels I communicated mostly in Japanese but occasionally in English

My inclination would be to say that, in general, you should use the conventions of the culture that you are writing for. If your target audience is Americans, than write the way Americans write.

I agree with Anna M: As an American, if I read something that referred to famous people by their first names I would find it very jarring. Like if you were writing about World War II and instead of talking about Churchill and Roosevelt and Stalin you called them Winnie and Frank and Joe, that would leap out of the page as just ... weird. If you actually knew these people personally and were describing personal conversations, that would be okay, but to talk about people you've never met by their first names sounds odd. On the other hand, if you were talking about your childhood and the other kids you played with and you referred to them as Mr Miller and Mr Brown, that would sound strange, too.

A big exception to this is if you're trying to give the feel of another culture. If you were writing a novel set in Sweden, I'd expect the characters to talk the way Swedes talk, not the way Americans talk. Or if you were describing a conversation by a group of Swedes, if Swedes routinely refer to famous people by their first names, then I think it would be correct to say, "I said that I thought Johannes was the greatest scientist of all time. He even had a unit of measure -- the Rydberg temperature scale -- named after him. But my friend Bjorn insisted that it was Alfred. He was not only a great scientist, but had established the famous prize fund. His brother held out for Svante, pointing out that he had made contributions to both physics and chemistry ..." If that's how they'd talk, then that's how I'd describe their conversation.

But if you're just giving general narrative, I'd use the conventions of the audience and not of the culture being described or of your home culture.

Load Full (0)

: Referring to people in a book I'm writing a book (travelogue) about Japan, comparing it to Sweden, where I'm from. During my travels I communicated mostly in Japanese but occasionally in English

@Annie587

Load Full 2 Comments

: How to become a productive/accomplished writer? I prefer writing short stories. Over the years, I have learnt many essential skills that I employ in my work. I believe (and this is my personal

@Annie587

Load Full 3 Comments

: Techniques for creating variety in prose When I write my short stories, I usually end up using a direct style as follows: Tim remembered the day he had to say goodbye to Cathy. He did

@Annie587

Load Full 5 Comments

: Overusing "the" and "I" I'm not a native English speaker, and I find that my English writing contains too many definite article "the" when writing scientific reports, and too many "I" when writing

: Re: Referring to people in a book I'm writing a book (travelogue) about Japan, comparing it to Sweden, where I'm from. During my travels I communicated mostly in Japanese but occasionally in English

More posts by @Annie587

: Referring to people in a book I'm writing a book (travelogue) about Japan, comparing it to Sweden, where I'm from. During my travels I communicated mostly in Japanese but occasionally in English

: How to become a productive/accomplished writer? I prefer writing short stories. Over the years, I have learnt many essential skills that I employ in my work. I believe (and this is my personal

: Techniques for creating variety in prose When I write my short stories, I usually end up using a direct style as follows: Tim remembered the day he had to say goodbye to Cathy. He did

: Overusing "the" and "I" I'm not a native English speaker, and I find that my English writing contains too many definite article "the" when writing scientific reports, and too many "I" when writing

Login to post a comment!

0 Comments

Back to top