Swear words in Fantasy (Warning: Actual swear word examples in post)

[BiggusBeardus]

Hello, folks!

Swearing in fantasy. How do you handle it?

I feel fine with damn, shit, fuck, and piss and all their variations, but what about "hell" and "god damnit". Those have real world basis.

I do have gods and there could be a hell (it's just the "underworld" right now), but I don't know about including them in swearing.

Some authors make up entirely new words and phrases. In the Wheel of Time series they say all kinds of stuff: Swearing and Insults

Is that the way to go? Make up a bunch of phrases?

Or should I stick to the good old dirty words we all know so people get the point?

 

[CupofJoe]

To my ear/eyes, those are modern words. If that is where you are writing, then fine. But for more of an other-timely feel, I'd make up new ones. That can be fun.

 

[Ned Marcus]

To my ear/eyes, those are modern words. If that is where you are writing, then fine. But for more of an other-timely feel, I'd make up new ones. That can be fun.

They can be funny, too. Battlestar Galactica's "frack off" or "mother fracker," made me laugh.

 

[Not_Alice]

Depends on what you're writing, I'd say. In modern day urban fantasy, you can use whatever you want. My YA MC goes out of her way to avoid the F-word, she'll use anything from fudge to sugar honey ice tea, while her boyfriend swears like a soldier. In my non-urban books, I base the swearing on religion. In one, fire is the central religious element, so I made up a bunch of phrases and idioms to accomodate that, like "flickering flames" meaning something like "well I never", or "one spark short of a bonfire", or "happy as a spark in a barrel full of kindling". I could go on and on...

 

[Finchbearer]

I don’t have a problem with reading a book that has profanities - but it also depends on whether you think they are even profanities. Do they really add to the dialogue or prose? Are they used all the time or sparingly? Cupofjoe makes a good point with swear words often sounding quite modern, and if your story is set in a historical time frame then would it make sense to have them using modern colloquialisms? I don’t like the made up variety to be honest when I’m reading - it just feels corny.

And I would also say that they don’t make a book feel any more mature or adult appropriate. Sometimes they can make a book not so mature.

I use some more tame profanities such as ‘shit’ and ‘piss’ - for context some of my characters are peasants and I think they would have used those words.

Underworld is a legitimate term for where one goes when they die - pre-Christian common term.

 

[Prince of Spires]

god damn and hell are world specific in my opinion. If your world has no god, or has multiple gods, then god damn wouldn't exist. Either because the concept simply doesn't exist, or because they'd be wondering which god you're referring to. Same with hell.

So you swear by a specific god, and if there's some terrible underworld, you use that. If not, stay away.

Of course, if you can make up your own which fit your world, then that would be even better. But that's hard to do right.

 

[BiggusBeardus]

I think I'm going to make up some stuff. I've generally tried to keep my stories pretty "clean" for the sake of younger readers, but I feel like I need something to fill the swearing need.

Thanks for the responses!

 

[Jackarandajam]

I think I'm going to make up some stuff. I've generally tried to keep my stories pretty "clean" for the sake of younger readers, but I feel like I need something to fill the swearing need.

Thanks for the responses!

Composing swears is a blast. A few short, punchy ones, a few common phrases with good illiteration..
I use "leyt fantasmic" as a sort of "holy shit,"
And "shunt" as a lot of different things.
I also use "winkhole" as an insult, but I feel like my mama would have slapped me for saying that about somebody real world, so it kinda negates the cleanup effect of making up profanity.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

I don't use fuck because it's too modern for me. But, I also have my main culture using insults and profanity that feel familiar. Horseshit. Son of a bitch. Pain in the ass. But I also use things like Dancing Bastards or variations on the Five Earls, both of which have backstories. The Forges is sort of like hell, and there are Twelve Hells... So I have a lot of familiar phrases and words, plus new stuff, plus things more archaic like whoreson.

I like to have fun with stuff:

“In exchange for visiting your mountain, I will teach you the language of my people.” Solineus proffered his hand. “The first word is ‘friend’.”

Morik grunted and didn’t accept his hand. “In the language of Helm, we say Carhôn maharôk tû. Meaning, a pain greater than a kick to my hungover gut. What words do you have for that?”

Solineus’ brow arched with a squint. “Pain in the ass.”

Morik nodded with the Edan translation. “Pain in the ass, like a thorn? These are good words to fit you. I will take you to the village of Yurhol and send a message to my king. He will decide, and if he says ‘no,’ then you ride back to your people and far from me. Far, far.”

“So far I can’t bring you the whiskey?”

“Not so far as that.” Morik shook his hand and spoke in Silone, “Pain in the ass friend.”

 

[Jason]

One character in my debut, a soldier, swears all the time and my (freelance) editor recommended I cut it down and only use occasional swearing for effect. But then there would have been no distinction from other characters, so in the end, I took it all out and explained early on that he swears every other word to let the reader fill it in.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

Oh, I'll also have cultures that swear more by using religious iconography and in more of a French/French-Canadien manner.

 

[pmmg]

Not many swear words in my stuff. Often, I just write things like...'So and so cursed', without saying the words.

Being damned is not the same as phrase like 'God Damn it' would infer. I could use, "May the Gods damn you', or "You will be damned for that' in a non-specific way. May be a case of damn with capital D or a lower case one...

In my own writing, I made up most of the swears, following somewhat the example of Howard in Conan, 'Crom and Mirtra', or 'you yellow livered cur', and Jordan's 'Blood and Ashes'.

No one has used the words that we would recognize here on earth. Fuck, Shit, Hell do not appear, and Damn gets a lot of consideration before I use it.

 

[Mad Swede]

Virtually no swear words at all in my stories. And for why? Because swearing is specific to both language and culture. The way we swear in Swedish and the words that we use as swear words are both quite different to the way in which people swear in English. So when you as an author start thinking about the sorts of swear words your characters might use you need to have though through your world building in some detail. It isn't just a question of using the swear words in your native language, at least not if you want to immerse the reader fully in your story and your setting. Which is mostly why I use expressions like "he swore under his breath" when I write. That and the fact that translation to other languages is a bit easier, always a consideration if you write in a language other than English and wish to aim for a wider readership.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

Thinking more... I don't use bitch, but son of a bitch makes more sense, although in some cultures, but not all, calling someone a witch would be fighting words. Damning someone is very serious, the gods being real and all. but godsdamned horse or other expressions would be common.

 

[pmmg]

I do think its kind of amazing, on our roadways and railroads, where you can see...they came to a mountain, and they just gouged their way through it or made a tunnel. What a huge amount of work that must have been. Same with trees. Just cut a path right through them. Its impressive in its way.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

No doubt about it. Feats of engineering over the ages are mind-boggling. There was one where I think the Romans (but it's been a while) cut through a mountain for water and started on both sides of the mountain and damned near ran into each other. They had a system where one curved so they'd find each other one way or another even if their measurements and dig was off a bit, but they were so spot on they probably wouldn't have needed it. When you see railroads and other roads through mountains, I always think of that. heck, even the modern road systems are impressive even if they seem every day ordinary now.

I do think its kind of amazing, on our roadways and railroads, where you can see...they came to a mountain, and they just gouged their way through it or made a tunnel. What a huge amount of work that must have been. Same with trees. Just cut a path right through them. Its impressive in its way.

 

[Jackarandajam]

I do think its kind of amazing, on our roadways and railroads, where you can see...they came to a mountain, and they just gouged their way through it or made a tunnel. What a huge amount of work that must have been. Same with trees. Just cut a path right through them. Its impressive in its way.

I've been thinning down a little patch of trees between the office and the road today. I thought it was no more than a dozen trees at a glance, but I must have cut 40 just to clear it up enough to see through.
Doing that, but back in the day, with axes and for miles and miles... you're quite right. An unbelievable feat of the human will.

 

[JessMahler]

I'm amused by the comments about 'fuck' feeling modern, given it's at least 500 years old.

I do prefer to create my own profanity, because of what it can tell the reader about a culture. In one of my stories, stillness/lack of movement is equated with death and evil, so "Stagnation!" (water that has sat still so long it's gone bad) is one of the most extreme profanities.

In another, a lost colony sci-fi, they venerate the Ancestors who travelled to a new world through the dark. So in stead of being 'damned to hell' or 'god damn' the characters say 'damned to darkness' or 'dark lost'.

I think this also makes for easier translation, if I ever get that far. And coming up with culturally relevant swear words I, for me, one of the more fun ways to build a culture's beliefs and mythos.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

I seriously doubt fuck was as prevalent and so widely used in so many forms of speech as it is today with its modern meanings. If used purely for sex, I'd be okay, but the numerous manners of use? Nah. The key to me is the feel, not whether its etymology goes back in time to find some germanic root. Plus, I get really sick of the word, probably because I think it so often, heh heh. Plus, my time period would go back farther in time. A classical Roman saying "fuck it" would feel rather wrong, or say, a Spartan king. So, the word did not port to my fantasy world. It's a tricky dance with a lot of words.

Earth is similar. My editor and I bickered back and forth about this one. I'm fine with lower case earth, but she is also right that a lot of readers don't get that earth preceded Earth, and it can affect one's reading. So, I decided to have fun working around my desire to use earth in my books. I won on using "score" as in a score of arrows, but I gave her the win on earth.

I'm amused by the comments about 'fuck' feeling modern, given it's at least 500 years old.

I do prefer to create my own profanity, because of what it can tell the reader about a culture. In one of my stories, stillness/lack of movement is equated with death and evil, so "Stagnation!" (water that has sat still so long it's gone bad) is one of the most extreme profanities.

In another, a lost colony sci-fi, they venerate the Ancestors who travelled to a new world through the dark. So in stead of being 'damned to hell' or 'god damn' the characters say 'damned to darkness' or 'dark lost'.

I think this also makes for easier translation, if I ever get that far. And coming up with culturally relevant swear words I, for me, one of the more fun ways to build a culture's beliefs and mythos.

 

[pmmg]

Yeah...I am well aware it is an old word. I just dont think it has the right feel for the world I am showing.

I also find that this is one of those words that will often take me out of the story. It's one of the main reasons I hate reading Steven King. So...you may be right, Silly me, I did not know it was an old word that might have shown up in my stories time period.... its still wrong word for my writing.