Non English Sentence in Epigraph

[patrick_lansing]

Hello there!

This is my first post, but I had a beginners question. I wanted to quote a Matsuo Basho haiku as my epigraph, but I am unsure if using kanji would be considered foul of the rules. Can anybody clear this up? Is a direct quotation in kanji alright to have?

 

[LilRora]

Scribble is technically an English-only site, but that refers to fiction as a whole, not like, the details. There are many stories that have other languages in dialogues, largely for immersion reasons. Largely curses, I think... but that's beside the point, that doesn't change the role those words have in the story, and they're doing fine, some are even among the most popular stories on the site. The Oscillation is one I remember.

So, yes. It's fine to use japanese language, either romanized or not, so long as it's an addition to the story, not a significant part of narration. It's doubtful many people will get what it says, but there's nothing wrong with putting it there.

 

[patrick_lansing]

Yes, but's going to be a quote. I hope there is no issue about fonts or something as such?

 

[Aader]

I like to color code different languages, while they are in English

 

[melchi]

Is it important that they understand it? There are some good reasons to do something but if it isn't something more than flavor it'll derail the story.
EX: In Shipcore there are some computer console readouts in binary. They are supposed to just be jibberish, and the story works with them just being jibberish but them having meaning is just a little extra.

 

[Jemini]

I've had entire conversations in my story in con-langs. As in, languages that exist nowhere except for in my own story. There is no one on earth who speaks these languages now, and there won't be until I complete my dictionary of this language and some theoretical super-fan in the future goes to the trouble of learning this language.

I did this for immersion reasons, the idea was that my main character does not understand this language, so when someone is greeting someone else who came in, all my character hears is "Tiikis ud ra-ii gi iir," and has no idea what any of that meant. (It roughly translates to "thank you for coming", BTW, although the literal words make reference to trees and life and things of the sort.)

The point is, the story as a whole is told from an English perspective, and anything and everything that's written in another language (mostly my own con-lang) is stuff the reader is not meant to understand and it's fine for story purposes that they don't. (The fact that the words actually mean something is just a bonus, I could have written @%*$&#$^*^ or something of the sort to represent the lack of understanding, but there's really nothing more immersion breaking than using random characters like that. I went through the trouble of creating a language because that's actually properly immersive.)

 

[patrick_lansing]

Oh, I totally get it for conlang.

I wasn't sure if real world languages would be allowed. Mostly, I thought they wouldn't be allowed as Kanji in a quotation. Seems like there shouldn't be any issue.

 

[Corty]

Oh, I totally get it for conlang.

I wasn't sure if real world languages would be allowed. Mostly, I thought they wouldn't be allowed as Kanji in a quotation. Seems like there shouldn't be any issue.

You can use it. I had in a story French & Bulgarians speak their own language. If you use the footnote option, you can also include the translation so the reader knows what's what.

 

[patrick_lansing]

You can use it. I had in a story French & Bulgarians speak their own language. If you use the footnote option, you can also include the translation so the reader knows what's what.

That's a cool tip. Thanks man! Footnotes make it look legit.