Why aren't people using quotes and dialogue tags?

[lnv]

I'm glad we ultimately agree on the original topic, but I have reservations about some of this post...

If you don't translate the text in a way that conveys the meaning, it's a bad translation.

Right, which is precisely why using brackets conveys the meaning better than doing your own thing.

You say this, but they don't actually work THAT differently in practice. A lot of the difficulty people have is just that Japanese tends to rely a lot more on context, is all. It can absolutely be a challenge, but it's not insurmountable or unusual. ?‍

English and Japanese work completely different. Everything from jumping from 1st person to 3rd person to tenses. And as any translation, you
gotta worry about how the story flows.

If it doesn't capture the essence and intent of the original text, well, that's ALSO a bad translation.

I'm not sure precisely what you're on about when you single out speech patterns as dumb, but your whole diatribe feels like it contradicts itself there once you get to the problem of characters not being distinct.

I said speech patterns are a dumb way to make it clear who which character is. I am not saying characters should not be distinct with their own speech patterns, I am saying there should always be some indicator on who the character is regardless of speech patterns or not.

Again, it isn't such a big issue for light novels when a person would read the entire things straight in a row. But for web novels where a person may be reading 1 chapter a week or a month, and reading dozens of other web novels. People may even have hard time remembering the names of some of the sub characters, let alone everyone's speech pattern.

For reference, in English that would be he said/she said. But that is more difficult to do with Japanese translations.

Wow. Now that's... uhm, a bold take. It's wrong, but I respect the audacity.

It simply is. You gotta understand, every medium has their own method of presentation.

Some works for example put names in front of the text.

There is no 1 solution fits all. You gotta adapt based on the type of work.

 

[CadmarLegend]

I've seen a fair number of stories at this point with a similar quirk.

- Specifically, one where dialogue looks like this (Khan)

That is, there's no quotation marks but instead a leading hyphen. In lieu of useful tags, the name of the character is just lazily slapped into parentheses at the end.

Where did this come from? I'd think it a quirk of an individual if it wasn't cropping up more and more. But that implies someone is teaching it as if it's good or standard practice... what in the world is going on here?

To be a bit unique or something?

 

[D_TNT]

- Specifically, one where dialogue looks like this (Khan)

That is, there's no quotation marks but instead a leading hyphen. In lieu of useful tags, the name of the character is just lazily slapped into parentheses at the end.

I never thought this was strange or unusual because it's very common in French books. It's just another smart way to write dialogue that get's rid of the "she said" or "he said" that often follow quotation mark.
It makes the dialogue flow better and faster and I grew up reading dialogue like this.
I think it even looks better on a page.

 

[witch_sorrowful]

I've seen a fair number of stories at this point with a similar quirk.

- Specifically, one where dialogue looks like this (Khan)

That is, there's no quotation marks but instead a leading hyphen. In lieu of useful tags, the name of the character is just lazily slapped into parentheses at the end.

Where did this come from? I'd think it a quirk of an individual if it wasn't cropping up more and more. But that implies someone is teaching it as if it's good or standard practice... what in the world is going on here?

Funny enough, James Joyce does exactly this in Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake.

 

[Nymus]

Yeah, I think heard British format is a bit different. Surprised to see "this," vs "this", once when came across it and wondered why comma was outside quotes and different.

I use sometimes the same. Cause I´m kind of lazy. The use of " instead ' to emphasize a word. When I 'emphazise' a word with quotations I don´t emphasize the punctuation.

 

[deltanz]

Do you mean the difference between ' and "?

One is for quotation, the other is for dialogue. That is in case you're wondering why people use ' instead of ".

I've seen people use ' instead of " for conversations instead of thoughts before. Not on here that I can remember but on another site I read on I see it all the time.

 

[Ai-chan]

I've seen people use ' instead of " for conversations instead of thoughts before. Not on here that I can remember but on another site I read on I see it all the time.

Yeah, it's either or. It's just dependent on who taught you writing and which country you live in. It's flipped in some countries. So it's not wrong if you see that happening, you just have to get used to it and try not to be critical about that despite feeling that it's wrong. Some countries don't use that system at all, and English speakers complain that it's weird when in reality, they just weren't taught to use those symbols.

 

[deltanz]

Yeah, it's either or. It's just dependent on who taught you writing and which country you live in. It's flipped in some countries. So it's not wrong if you see that happening, you just have to get used to it and try not to be critical about that despite feeling that it's wrong. Some countries don't use that system at all, and English speakers complain that it's weird when in reality, they just weren't taught to use those symbols.

Normally doesn't bother me too much, just have to get used to reading it that way instead of with " but most stories I've found/read that use it at least put in A/N's that they write that way so I can figure it out easily.

 

[MorgueAnna]

....because they have a little profile pic in front of every dialogue that tells you, like the below:

Spoiler: EXAMPLE

View attachment 7444

I might try messing with this method sometime. I wonder if it'd be doable in scribblehub?

 

[skillet]

I might try messing with this method sometime. I wonder if it'd be doable in scribblehub?

eyy that would be pretty cool! though also probably a lot of work, haha

 

[AliceShiki]

I've seen a fair number of stories at this point with a similar quirk.

- Specifically, one where dialogue looks like this (Khan)

That is, there's no quotation marks but instead a leading hyphen. In lieu of useful tags, the name of the character is just lazily slapped into parentheses at the end.

In my native language, this is pretty normal, though it would usually be like this:

Blablablabla, Khan said:

- Blebleblebleble.


So, my guess is that the person writing this is not a native English speaker and just assumed that this format is common in English too.

 

[SpaurdaD]

I've seen a fair number of stories at this point with a similar quirk.

- Specifically, one where dialogue looks like this (Khan)

That is, there's no quotation marks but instead a leading hyphen. In lieu of useful tags, the name of the character is just lazily slapped into parentheses at the end.

Where did this come from? I'd think it a quirk of an individual if it wasn't cropping up more and more. But that implies someone is teaching it as if it's good or standard practice... what in the world is going on here?

It's probably due to different cultures. I know that different cultures have different tags or have different ways that indicate that a character is speaking, but for English speakers, we use the hyphen.

 

[alex_lightwind]

Yeaaah, i kinda did this.

I constantly used - to designate the dialogue because in my native language it is used this way in literature.

now i feel stupid because i subconsciously assumed it is the same in English as well :D
At least its not a big deal to fix this.

 

[Representing_Tromba]

It's just different grammar rules. It's not necessarily bad but it does go against proper English grammar, which is constantly changing due to our fragile sense of control and people in top hats.

 

[OokamiKasumi]

Is it bad though?

YES.

 

[ThrillingHuman]

YES.

y