The voices in my head have British accents...

[gridlore]

... and seem to be fond of alliteration.

I recently dredged up a story fragment I wrote several years ago for a fresh look. I rewrote it to take it out of the Warhammer40K universe, and expanded it a bit. At which point, Kollin, my view point character, started speaking like a Brit.

This was not planned. He just got written that way without my really intending it. Works for me.

Then I was writing what will be the second half of chapter 1. At some point, I swear Kollin looked at me and said, quite distinctly, "you know I'm lying about all of this, right? I'm a con man, a liar. Congrats, me boy, you have your first Unreliable Narrator." Which means I'm free to take Kollin on a twisted tale, and reveal at the end he made the whole thing up to amuse himself while being interviewed by a historian.

I've already done a first draft of the final chapter.

Does this happen to other writers?

Comments

[nodrog]

It's probably because his name is pronounced “Colin,” a particularly British name.

If “recently” is post-Izzard, that would help explain it also.

As I said in a writing meme long ago, “I'm a writer, not a nut; I don't hear voices in my head.”  But when a character shifts around into a better form than originally intended, it can indeed be quite satisfying.

[gridlore]

The name is a nod to Dani and Eytan Kollin, who have been very supportive of my attempts to start writing.

The writing was done pre-Izzard, but I will admit that the show did add a few wrinkles.

[nodrog]

This can actually be useful.  I have a character who is American, but from the 1940s, before targeted, subverted “education majors” abandoned education in favor of indoctrination, and thus public-school educational standards were higher for all social levels - with sometimes odd results…  Thus, though she speaks with an ordinary Midwest accent, I find it useful to imagine her with a Classic Doctor Who Companion BBC accent, Hayley Mills or Jenny Agutter or Emma Watson, because that influences her word choice and grammar and enunciation, all of which would in fact sound like the above examples doing a perfect American accent.

[If you ever see a 1940s high school textbook in a thrift store or someplace, look through it - and be amazed.  Remember, every student had to know this material or they couldn't graduate!]