Golly Gee Willikers!
- Eve Anthony Hanninen
- Dec 29, 2017
- 3 min read
We’ve all grown up with slang, cultural idioms, and whimsical or metaphoric, regional phrasings, righto? Some of it has stuck with us for a long time, because, well, it’s cool and awesome to be in-the-(popular)-know. These terms have a ring to them, and they’re easy to remember. They are modern . . . uh, right?
"Golly Gee" by E. A. Hanninen, 2017. (Posterized Batman & Robin Models, from Hot Toys.)
Slang is contemporary for a brief while in time, mostly when the terms are first coined and passing along a mostly youthful buzzline.
Slang is born like a secret code — its purpose is to communicate in subterranean fashion and is meant to bypass the censorial comprehension of authority figures (parents, teachers, police) and, um, uncool nosers of any ilk. When the general populace begins to decode any particular slang word, it is deemed broken by its original users. And then, the word jitters out to haunt its space in the verbal cemetery of public overuse.
Most of us non-originators don’t note this pattern. When slang goes public, we think it’s meant for us to liberally salt everyday conversation with it. We trade it with other happy adults, who are grateful for another chance at being hip. Retail advertisers gleefully insert 15-year-old, street jargon into their commercials and brochures, hoping for a shot at the wallets of the down-to-earth appreciative.
And, oh, writers. Is it okay to use slang, idioms, colloquialisms, and your mother’s favorite, weird, copycat phrases in your manuscript? Of course! No! Yes! Ugh! (I’d have written those all over the top of one another if I could have. Imagine 4 voices shouting out all at once.)
Of course!
Just about anything goes in dialogue. As people are the ones guilty of talking some enormously creative (and goofy) crapitola, it is A-OK to allow for smack-talkin’ characters, as long as it would be “in character” for them. Within dialogue is the BEST location for slang and jingle-repeatin’.
No!
Most slang words, etc., don’t stay modern. They become dated, and are often peculiarly regional. When these phrasings are planted in the narrative body of your work, especially in an obviously, intrusively, authorial sense, they tend to sour the milk. You want your writing to remain fresh for years to come. You want your readers to remain immersed in the setting and time period you’ve established; your personal, colloquial witticisms will always feel out of place, unless the entire piece is steeped in a culturally-related era or locale. Bear in mind, this latter workaround will still date your story, and you will have to remain vigilant against slipping into your normal “voice.”
Yes!
You must stay true to human nature when writing about people. People . . . say
. . . things. People are clever, funny, sometimes sarcastic, and must express themselves. They like to repeat things they’ve heard. They love a catchy phrase or quote, and they will tip into a chorus spontaneously. Some people use a lot of idioms. Some people think in trendy H4x0R (haxxor/hacker) codes, such as 1337 (leet/elite-speak). When writing from within a character’s point of view, you will likely decide that his or her attitudes, mannerisms, and spoken characteristics might well include an assortment of common or uncommon catchphrases. The key to making such usage feel natural within the work is to use it judiciously. Appropriately.
Ugh!
If you must write like you talk, have a care that your idioms and colloquial patter fit in with the tone, setting, time-period, and educational backgrounds of your characters. If your narrator is urging his horse down a woodsy mountain path, is he really going to comment to himself, “Put the pedal to the metal”? Not unless he’s an ace, race-car driver who finds himself relegated to an escape on horseback.
Nothing gets me to stop reading a book faster than contemporary lingo jangling from a non-technological, post-apocalyptic-survival, fantasy, medieval, or historical-fiction story. Geez!
And does anybody know what a williker is?
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