Foul-Mouth Novels

I have a confession to make. I read the advice column “Annie’s Mailbox” in my local paper. It started as a search for story ideas and has now become a habit. Usually, I think “good advice,” “bad advice,” or “there are two sides to that story,” but sometimes I feel compelled to respond—then don’t. However, Wednesday’s column has prompted this blog post.*

A while ago, someone wrote in because she was upset by the frequency of the F-word in contemporary novels. Annie’s response was that “Usually, anything said with the F-word could be better said without it. More than anything, it’s lazy.” This week, she printed a response from a writer who took issue with that stance. Here is a quote from this week’s letter:**

As a person, I avoid profanity and completely agree that such words are a lazy means of expressing oneself, but as a writer, I try to represent my characters and who they are as people. And some people swear—so in dialogue, I must represent that character truthfully.

Yes, some people swear and we must represent our characters truthfully. And I’m not opposed to a limited (as in rare) use of swear words in dialogue to create a sense of authenticity in those genres where readers know what they are getting before they pick up the book. But even those books shouldn’t be using it in narrative or as an excuse to be lazy rather than creative.

Readers are smarter than we think, and they can pick up a person’s emotions, personality, and normal way of talking without being fed the character’s actual words. This is especially important to remember when writing middle-grade fiction, where swearing may be acceptable but swear words are not.

In the Harry Potter books, J.K. Rowling takes the direct approach. She simply says, “Harry swore.” She doesn’t give us the words, but we know how Harry feels at that moment.

Another option is to use the context and the characters’ actions. I just completed the manuscript for a middle-grade novel told after-the-fact by my twelve-year-old protagonist. In this scene, which takes place on a Mississippi riverboat in 1850, Ma is accompanying Lizzie and her younger sisters to the outhouse shared by all the deck passengers. I’ll pick it up right after Ma knocks on the door.

“Almost done, you _____.”

I won’t write what he called us, but Ma covered Sarah’s ears and Rose covered her own.

Some people use F*** or !@#$%^& to represent swearing, but even that lacks creativity in my opinion. Yes, I used a blank in my passage, but the real impact comes from the paragraph that follows it. Either take the route J.K. Rowling does or find another way to convey it.

Fiction is an art, not a courtroom trial, and good novels don’t include verbatim transcripts of what was said. If they did, every character's dialogue would be filled with ums and ahs and rambling speeches and ho-hum moments that put the reader to sleep—if he or she hasn’t already tossed the book aside. So find a better way to convey foul language.

Your readers will thank you.

__________

* The Times, October 17, 2018, pg. D6 (Lake County Edition).

** The letters printed in the column are often condensed and I sometimes wonder if they lose part of the context in the process, but this is the way it was printed in The Times.