A great example of wonderful dialogue that seems to be very authentic (and easy to read) are the Brother Cadfael books by Ellis Peters (aka Edith Pargeter). The Cadfael books are set perhaps a bit earlier than your target time (they take place in 12th century England) but they're terrific. I often marvel at how she wrote the dialogue; it's very natural to the modern ear yet also quite elegant and comes across as authentic to the times. (After all, for the most part, we can only guess or surmise the way medieval people spoke.)

Anyway, read a Cadfael book. Not only will you be immersed in a interesting story with excellent characters, but the dialogue will be a good example of period speech done right.

 

I read a Big Five novel, not fantasy, not humour, set in 15th c England, where someone calls one of the lords a 'smooth operator' and says that a certain event was 'just a blip.' I really, really wanted to fling the book out the window except it might have hit a cat or something...

That. Is. Ridiculous.
I was reading a fantasy novel I picked up at a used bookshop and it has a line of dialogue "we'll be all right." The rest of the dialogue I saw wasn't that bad. That's what I'm trying to avoid. Dialogue is hard anyway, seems harder for a medieval fantasy.

 

One trick I have always used if I am in doubt about a word is to look it up on one of the online dictionary sites and it will tell you when a word was first used. Maybe 14th century or 18th or 19th. If you're lucky it will give you the sentence it was first used in and that's a bonus, you can see typical diction for that time.

 

I read a Big Five novel, not fantasy, not humour, set in 15th c England, where  someone calls one of the lords a 'smooth operator' and says that a certain event was 'just a blip.' I really, really wanted to fling the book out the window except it might have hit a cat or something...

 

Instead of saying "Are you okay?" it should be "Are you well?", for example.

Yes, that's the sort of thing. I'm not keen on 'Are you all right' either, although it's a step above 'okay.' A slightly older word for wellness is 'hale'; old but probably not so obscure that it would leave the reader nonplussed.

 

For me, I try to avoid phrases and sayings that are unique to our time and culture. 'The cat is out of the bag', that kind of thing. I'll try to come up with something that the readers can understand but makes sense within the context of the world I'm creating.

The ferret has fled the pouch. May be enhanced with a 'forsooth' or 'verily' if that's how you roll.

Yeah, I've got nothing else to contribute. I still haven't gotten over the embarrassment of referring to Old English as 'Middle English' in conversation with a historian.

 

Slang.

Research slang used in that period. Invent your own slang which makes sense.

Avoid modern slang.

That goes a LONG way towards setting the reader in place.

 

A formalistic character may use thees and thous

Thees and thous weren't formal, just normal everyday speech across the population

 

For me, it's all about intention. What's the exact feel that I'm aiming for? That's what really matters. Do this for each character. A formalistic character may use thees and thous, while a lower class character may butcher the language with thick slang. The language reveals each character, and through that, the time and place.

Language creates the illusion of a time and place, like a stage set creates a location. It's job is to create the correct atmosphere for the story. That means that parts of the language may have to be exaggerated, while other parts are minimized.

If you can find a novel or play from a time period that you'd like to emulate, that will give you more and better than anything else.

 

• When your characters talk about why something happened, they might attribute bad behavior to the devil, or recognize acts as punishment for past sins.
• When your characters want to talk about how awesome something is, they might quote from a Greek or Roman text (or your fantasy world equivalent of it) or name drop major figures from classical times.
• When your characters talk about their lives, they're likely to use metaphors and comparisons drawn from subsistence farming (for low class characters) or from managing an estate (upper class characters).

I read a really great book recently called Eifelheim which is a historical fiction/sci-fi story where a bunch of aliens crash-land in 14th century Germany. The author clearly knew his medieval history back to front, and I was really impressed with how he painted this picture of a medieval world which was totally at odds with my (completely stereotypical) view of what the time was like. Not superstitious peasants in muddy hovels, but real human beings like you or me who just have a completely different frame of reference for viewing the world. Their local priest is well-educated in the classics and there came a point, reading his dialogue and his thinking and reasoning and deduction, where I thought "this person is smarter than me."

All classes appear to have been pretty earthy for most of the period, except in formal situations. Clerks tended to dress it up prettily when they recorded it or took dictation.

I've often thought this might be the case, and would flow into written fiction pretty well, but all the film and TV adaptations you see have them speaking super formally too. I've always thought it was more about etiquette and mannerisms than a style of speaking which necessarily reflected the inner narrative of individuals.

 

It depends what kind of fantasy you're writing. There are fantasy books that strive for historical accuracy in how people would have lived and spoke, but they are a very small minority. Most readers simply want escapism. Find a fantasy author you like to read and you think is who you want to write like. Read their dialogue. Brandon Sanderson, George RR Martin, Robert Jordan, whatever. Clearly readers accept their dialogue. You likely don't need any 'thous'.

For me, I try to avoid phrases and sayings that are unique to our time and culture. 'The cat is out of the bag', that kind of thing. I'll try to come up with something that the readers can understand but makes sense within the context of the world I'm creating. Personally, I also avoid using real-world measurements (yards, weeks, minutes) but that's really a pet peeve as most fantasy writers still rely on them. It may sound ridiculous, but I make up measurements that are fairly easy to understand. 'He waited a dozen heartbeats' 'The sword was three span of rippling steel' 'he waited until the bell tolled for the second watch and then he slipped from his bed' that sort of thing. I really don't think readers care, but for some reason I do.

 

the flowery, formal way of speech we associate with older times, even up to the 19th century, was a marker of the educated upper classes. The lower classes spoke to each other much more casually.

All classes appear to have been pretty earthy for most of the period, except in formal situations. Clerks tended to dress it up prettily when they recorded it or took dictation.

Also worth remembering that English didn't start settling down until the end of the Middle Ages. French and Anglo-Norman were important after 1066, probably in decline after a few hundred years but remained important to the end. Latin was important throughout, but only conversationally important (probably) between important churchmen or as a lingua franca in people who shared no other language. At the beginning there was Danish (maybe some Norse) and Anglo-Saxon and the latter continued as the main language in some areas of England until the end of the period. Brythonic languages continued to be spoken in the west throughout. And that's just England and Wales.
But from the point of view of writing a book, most readers won't know that and it's best avoided unless you want to make a feature of it.

 

You've gotten a lot of good advice. Another consideration for the dialogue is to think about the character's worldview. I'm gonna guess that you're writing about medieval Europe (or a fantasy world based on it). If that's the case, then here are some period-specific considerations

• The Roman Catholic church is the source of truth and not to be questioned
• Classical Greek and Roman writers and philosophers are considered the best ever.
• There is virtually no middle class. Almost everyone is a farmer who is beholden to a feudal lord.

How will these affect your dialogue?

• When your characters talk about why something happened, they might attribute bad behavior to the devil, or recognize acts as punishment for past sins.
• When your characters want to talk about how awesome something is, they might quote from a Greek or Roman text (or your fantasy world equivalent of it) or name drop major figures from classical times.
• When your characters talk about their lives, they're likely to use metaphors and comparisons drawn from subsistence farming (for low class characters) or from managing an estate (upper class characters).

Do you have a favorite medieval fantasy novel that sounds like you'd like your fiction to sound? One of the best ways to tune your ear is to read the dialogue from the scenes of a similar novel out loud.

Hope that helps!

 

Really, the best way is to just use standard English with minimal contractions and a minimum of modern slang. I've seen some authors get away with deliberately using a more modern idiom, or modern swear words, but usually they manage that within the constraints of a very realistically drawn ancient time period. I mean, the reader will know that when the author uses , say, the f-bomb, it is just a 'translation' of what the people in the story really said. Certain words and phrases will never, ever fit a period piece, however--one of the most jarring, in both books and films, and one that appears a lot is, 'Are you okay?'

Pretty much this. It's impossible to write in the dialogue of the time because it's almost unintelligible to the modern reader. There's a novel called The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth set in 1066 which is written, sort of like Russell Hoban's book Ridley Walker, in an invented language which is meant to mimic Old English while still being phoenetically comprehensible to the modern reader. It's a fantastic book but certainly wouldn't want every piece of fantasy I read to sound like it.

Another point I've noticed (mostly from reading Patrick O'Brien) is that the flowery, formal way of speech we associate with older times, even up to the 19th century, was a marker of the educated upper classes. The lower classes spoke to each other much more casually.

 

If you want it to be accurate, do your research. The middle ages were from the 5-15 century but the Elizabethan period was just after that, which would be into early modern English.

 

My go-to example for Ye Olde Times dialogue that sounds superficially plausible but also witty and easy to understand, is the film version of Robin Hood starring Errol Flynn.

The advice on avoiding modern slang and reducing contractions seems sound to me.

 

There's genre dialogue, some of it written by writers who have no idea except vague memories of old films, and some written by writers who do have an idea but are working to make it appeal to readers who don't know, but need it to feel right. And I don't know of resources for that except reading the most acclaimed books in the genre. Some genre writers have a long academic record of research in the periods they write about.

Then there's real dialogue and language. There are resources for that - collections of letters and diaries; and mustn't forget accounts of trials. Many of them are surprisingly easy to read. The Paston letters are especially famous. The problem with using this language is that the readers you are aiming at may not like the real thing. But it might help get you into the right mood. There are also examples of dialogue in mediaeval plays; few early records but quite a lot for the late period and Elizabethan.

 

Instead of saying "Are you okay?" it should be "Are you well?", for example. 

 

Really, the best way is to just use standard English with minimal contractions and a minimum of modern slang. I've seen some authors get away with deliberately using a more modern idiom, or modern swear words, but usually they manage that within the constraints of a very realistically drawn ancient time period. I mean, the reader will know that when the author uses , say, the f-bomb, it is just a 'translation' of what the people in the story really said. Certain words and phrases will never, ever fit a period piece, however--one of the most jarring, in both books and films, and one that appears a lot is,  'Are you okay?'