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What do You Think of Archaic Prose?

Laurence

Inkling
My WIP is a medieval fantasy adventure. My writing inadvertently tends to hover on the border of quite modern language similar to that of Rothfuss and Sanderson's. The occasional word or sentence structure becomes more apparent in certain characters' voices but sometimes I feel like I go too far.

Do you find that archaic language, used well, can make a story more immersive in an old setting or do you just find it tedious and / or gimmicky?

If you can, pinpoint a snippet from a story which you think is just modern or archaic enough for you to endure and one that you adore.
 

Corwynn

Troubadour
In my most humble of opinion, an antique mode of narration and dialogue lends an air of verisimilitude, and evokes most splendidly an epoch and a locale long distant, into which the reader becomes immersed, to their great satisfaction. However, one ought be cautious of excessive profusion of cumbersome verbiage, and avoid bewildering the humble reader with superfluous circumlocutions and pretentious obfuscations of hitherto prosaic and comprehensible vocabulary.

*Ahem* As you can see, I am a fan of the pseudo-Victorian variety of Archaic Prose. To some extent, this my natural writing and speaking style, though thankfully not as over-the-top as you see above. The key to using Archaic Prose well is consistency. The dialogue, and/or narration style should have plenty of subtle differences from modern language throughout. If, instead, you merely insert fancy old-fashioned words into otherwise modern prose, people will notice, and think you are showing off, or trying too hard.

A good example of Archaic Prose would be Johnathan Strange and Mr. Norrel by Susanna Clarke. She maintains a consistent Regency-style narration throughout, as befits the setting, complete with archaic spellings, and period-appropriate literary quirks such as liberal use of footnotes (at least one of which takes up more page space than the actual text). In all, it is meant to evoke the novels of Jane Austen in style.

A poor example would be the Bitterbynde trilogy by Cecelia Dart-Thornton. While they aren't bad books in my opinion, she clearly tries too hard with the Archaic Prose style. Words like "raiment" instead of "clothing" or "garments" tend to leap out at you like a slap in the face. She also likes to show off, and at one point even spends a paragraph on nothing more than a list of medieval kitchen utensils.

I find that it helps to read documents (especially literary works) from the time period you want to evoke, to find out how people wrote and spoke. However, this is more of a challenge the farther back you go, due to there being fewer surviving examples, and changes in language rendering the originals unreadable.
 

Laurence

Inkling
Thanks so much. Your first paragraph was enough to convince me I’m not going anywhere too archaic with my language, which is tight.

I think I’m pretty consistent but I certainly haven’t done any research on the way people spoke at the time each race was based on. Gawd.
 

WooHooMan

Auror
I don't think Corwynn sounds archaic there, just overwritten. That's the issue: most writers can't seem to tell the difference between the two.
The trick is that it has nothing to do with vocabulary. It's all about grammar.
 

Tom

Istar
I don't think Corwynn sounds archaic there, just overwritten. That's the issue: most writers can't seem to tell the difference between the two.
The trick is that it has nothing to do with vocabulary. It's all about grammar.
Agreed. I use an archaic or semi-archaic style fairly frequently and it usually doesn't involve heavy thesaurus abuse. If anything, I try to steer clear of Latinate words, using ones with an Anglo-Saxon origin a lot more.
 

Demesnedenoir

Myth Weaver
Well, I can’t stand Rothfuss, but Sanderson is decent... hmm. I’m not sure if the prose is the issue, however. I don’t want full blown archaic... I read Chaucer in M.E., I don’t need that heada... I mean joy, again. But there is a fine line where modern language can damage the story.

I would say Rothfuss writes too modern for me. Or maybe not... I just don’t like his work. If it were a portal fantasy... ala the Rothfuss fan, Mr. Malik, then the modern language makes sense so it doesn’t bug me. There’s a wide range of sensibilities in the world on this topic, i’m sure.
 

Heliotrope

Staff
Article Team
This is a tough one to answer.

I believe that you absolutely must find your own voice and have confidence in it. You cannot make your voice different because you think it would be 'cooler', or whatever. It is almost always obvious and tacky when a writer tries to write in a voice that is not natural to them. Your voice is what gives your story style and personality. It is what gives it a heart beat.

So, if you naturally tend to want to write in an archaic way, because you speak that way and think that way and that is how stories come to you... then do it. It will feel smooth and natural to the reader.

But if you don't... then don't do it. It will feel weird and stilted and like you are trying too hard.

Only you can know the answer to that.

I liked Rothfuss' writing style. It was what kept me reading the first book. When I got to the end of the book I was very disappointed with the story. I just didn't like it at all. But I did like his writing style because it felt authentic to him.

I also like old writing styles, but I like them because they are old. It was the writing style of the time and I can appreciate it for it's historical value. I'm not sure how I feel about contemporary author's purposely using that style though... I think at the end of the day you really need to explore how you, personally, tell a story, and be okay with that.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
It is a tough one to answer, especially for the new writer because they very likely do not know their own voice. Heck, I had been writing for forty years and did not know I had a voice. I just wrote stuff. Then I was in a writing group and someone said they liked my voice. It was evident to them, even if it was not to me. I confess I still don't know how to find a voice. It's not in any of the drawers in my kitchen, not even in the junk drawer.

Worse, I'm not sure I'd know it if I were somehow to write in not-my-voice. So, in response to the OP: I dunno. Go write stuff. Tell the story the best way you know how and don't worry about voice or any of the rest of it. Get five stories done. All the way to done, which means editing and reviews. At some point, someone is sure to say something about your voice. Smile and thank them (or cringe and hide! <grin>).
 
I'm a little uncertain about what constitutes archaic in this discussion.

Sanderson has this thing where he uses "save for" a lot. I commented on this in a related thread once [over two years ago! Time flies!]

Two examples from The Way of Kings:

The hallway hushed, save for a child's sniffles.

...the Calling of a farmer was a noble one, one of the highest save for the Calling of a soldier.

Is this archaic usage or merely an old-timey dialect sort of thing?

The hallway hushed, except for a child's sniffles ...simply doesn't carry the same feel. It's not bad, and in a novel set in medieval times, it would not throw me out of the milieu one bit. (But then, I might not know what I'm missing: the difference that "save" might have made just right there.)

What about this: The hallway hushed, but for a child's sniffles?

Heh, language options.

There are other word choices that can give the same feel as "save for." What about, He like to never got that damn collar on the horse; it kept fidgeting, and his hands were so sweaty and shaking he kept losing his grip on the straps.

Well this might also be an example of what happens when someone fairly unfamiliar with horses tries to write something like that—me!

So, I don't know...

I'm like Demesnedenoir, in the sense that I like to never got into certain novels because of too-modern speech—save for a few light comic -adventure novels. In fact, I fairly hate seeing purely modern speech in most fantasy novels with a medieval setting.

However, a lot of words and manners of speech seem timeless to me. I could excerpt large sections from Sanderson's writing and have no problem "hearing" them in our modern world, coming from the people around me.

I think this might be one of those things where little bits and pieces, here and there, can give the illusion of an old-timey setting—no need for archaic language all throughout—but that, in those cases, you'll want to avoid the extremely jarring "OMG, take a breather dude" sorts of things in a medievalish novel.
 
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skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
FifthView brings up a good point: what feels archaic to one reader may well read as elegant prose to another.

I say again, don't worry about this. Write the story. Make it sound good to your own ears. Let your beta readers and your editors tell you if they have problems with the voice.
 

Heliotrope

Staff
Article Team
Make it sound good to your own ears.

This is it for me, too. Does it sound good to you? Do you like the sound of it? Does it feel right to you. Don't make your voice do gymnastics just to please an invisible reader.

And, don't ever ask a group of writers what sort of voice they prefer before the story has even begun. ;) You will get a hundred different answers and likely destroy any excitement you had about your project in it's infancy.

Try writing it in the voice you prefer, then post the story once it is written. Only then can people honestly say whether they like the style or not (and by then you won't care anymore, anyway.)
 
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I do think a consideration must be made about character voices (case of close third limited) and narrator voices. So for the consideration Heliotrope gave, you might ponder whether you like those voices, whether they seem right to you.
 

Laurence

Inkling
Thanks so much for your thoughts everyone. I’m quite happy to proceed with what I think is quite a natural narrative voice for me. Moreso thanks to you.

As for various characters of mine, they span a really wide range of ages so I think going too modern will be the main thing to be careful of. I don’t think I’ll have any issues with going too old timey.
 
I sort of have mixed feelings for that type of language. Probably because English isn't my native language.

I do like to see it during character dialogues cause I feel it can add to those characters, it gives us the impression that this character comes from high standing or had a pretty decent education, etc...

But if it's used throughout the story as both the dialogue and narration then I tend to shy away from those stories because I end up reaching for the dictionary too much because I can't understand what they're talking about half of the time. Like per example what Corwynn said in his post.

The last sentence of the first paragraph, I just got lost with it. x-x
 

Hallen

Scribe
Don't do it unless it's really necessary for the character.
Also, don't do accents, or if you do, do it very little so the reader gets the idea.
A little grammar and a few phrases are usually enough to get the idea across, don-chya-know.

Archaic language in what context? Is this an old-English character brought forward to modern times?
If everybody is set in the same timeframe, then why use it? It will get very cumbersome and will really frustrate readers.
It can be cool when reading from some ancient tome, or something like that.
 
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