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In the Magic Tree House series, two ordinary English-speaking kids travel to different faraway lands through a portal. Every character they meet, whether it's ancient Greece or ancient China, speak...
#3: Attribution notice added
by
System
·
2019-12-08T06:18:13Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/27415 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision
by
Sharpie
·
2019-12-08T06:18:13Z (almost 5 years ago)
In the _Magic Tree House_ series, two ordinary English-speaking kids travel to different faraway lands through a portal. Every character they meet, whether it's ancient Greece or ancient China, speaks English. However, this series was aimed at little kids, and when you're writing for an older audience, do you _have_ to explain away the language barrier conundrum? More importantly, if your story employs lots of rhyming riddles and 'lost prophecies' from other worlds, would the story instantly lose its credibility if they all happen to be in English? (E.g., main character discovers lost scroll in Egypt. It's a rhyme in English!) I know suspension of belief is required for all fantasy stories, but at what point do you try to explain the mechanics, and when can you just hand-wave it all under the rug?
#1: Imported from external source
by
System
·
2017-03-31T17:46:59Z (over 7 years ago)
Original score: 4