497876
2013
LAL22410.1177/0963947013497876Language and LiteratureHodson and Broadhead
Article
Developments in literary
dialect representation in
British fiction 1800–1836
Language and Literature
22(4) 315­–332
© The Author(s) 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/0963947013497876
lal.sagepub.com
Jane Hodson
University of Sheffield, UK
Alex Broadhead
University of Liverpool, UK
Abstract
This study draws on findings from the ‘Dialect in British Fiction 1800–1836’ project to describe
changes in literary dialect representation in novels published during the second half of the
Romantic Period. We identify an overall increase in literary dialect representation, and trace the
different trajectories of Scots, Irish English, Welsh English, London English and Regional English
varieties. We consider why literary dialect representation increased in the novel during this
period, and why some literary dialects proved more popular than others. In conclusion we argue
that while the overall picture presented by this project is one of increased speech by characters
from the lower classes, this increase should not be interpreted as de facto evidence of greater
acceptance of dialect and dialect speakers.
Keywords
Dialect representation, Irish English, literary dialect, novel, Romantic Period, Scots, Welsh
English
1 Introduction
This study draws on both quantitative and qualitative findings from the ‘Dialect in British
Fiction 1800–1836’ project to describe changes in literary dialect representation in novels
published during the early 19th century. As with all stylistic features, literary dialects are
a set of techniques and conventions that have emerged over time. In this article we focus
on the period 1800–1836 as a time of rapid change in these techniques and conventions.
Corresponding author:
Jane Hodson, University of Sheffield, School of English, Jessop West, S3 7RA, Sheffield South Yorkshire, UK.
Email: [email protected]
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Language and Literature 22(4)
While there certainly are dialect-speaking characters to be found in 18th-century fiction
– in the novels of Henry Fielding, Tobias Smollett, and Frances Burney among others –
the dialect of these characters is typically depicted through a small number of highly stereotypical features for comic effect. By the Victorian period a much broader range of
dialect-speaking characters have emerged who are afforded more serious roles and whose
dialects are represented more consistently and in more detail, as can be seen in the novels
of Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot. Something changed in the handling of literary dialect in the transition from the 18th to the 19th century, and this study
begins to address the question of how and why that change occurred.1
To date, surprisingly little work has been undertaken tracing the development of dialect representation during the key early 19th-century period. The most notable exception
is Norman Blake’s survey Non-standard Language in English Literature (1981), in
which he dedicates a chapter to the Romantic Period. In this chapter Blake identifies two
main factors for the development of literary dialects in novels across the period: the
innovations of individual authors and the increasing ‘acceptability’ of non-standard varieties. Blake pinpoints Maria Edgeworth as pivotal, describing Castle Rackrent (1800) as
the ‘first regional novel in English’ (1981: 135). He traces a direct line of influence from
Edgeworth to Walter Scott and through to James Hogg, suggesting that ‘it was Miss
Edgeworth who gave Scott the confidence to make a provincial novel with non-standard
speakers’ (1981: 137). Blake concludes that although non-standard varieties of English
were ‘gaining acceptability’ by the end of the period, ‘only the Scots and Irish varieties
found acceptance’ during the Romantic Period itself (1981: 146).
Blake’s account is valuable, but it is brief and based upon canonical authors. His reliance on traditional period boundaries results in an emphasis on differences between periods, and a concomitant lack of attention to changes within periods. As such it leaves
many questions unanswered. For example, what happened during the 14-year gap
between the publication of Edgeworth’s Castle Rackrent (1800) and Scott’s first novel
Waverley (1814)? Did innovation occur equally in both Scots and Irish English? Why is
Welsh English not mentioned? And if non-standard varieties of English were ‘gaining
acceptability’ why did this not manifest in the novels of the period? On closer inspection,
Blake’s summary looks like an excellent point of departure for a study of influences,
techniques and ideologies of dialect representation in the novels of the Romantic Period,
rather than the final word on the subject.
It is in any case a good time to reassess the issue of dialect representation.
Developments within dialectology – particularly what might be described as the ‘stylistic turn’ of recent years – offer new ways of thinking about dialect in literature (see
Coupland, 2007 for an excellent survey of this work). Previously, dialectologists took
‘the authentic speaker’ as the subject for their analyses, and therefore found little to
interest them in the self-evidently inauthentic literary representations of dialect in the
19th century. However, in recent years the ideal of ‘the authentic speaker’ has come
under increasing scrutiny, and greater attention has been paid to the ways in which
dialects are both performed and perceived by ordinary speakers (see Bucholtz, 2003;
Coupland, 2003, 2007; Eckert, 2003; for applications to literary dialect see Hakala,
2010; Leigh, 2011). Developments in the study of the History of the English Language
have led to much more nuanced understandings of the discourses of prescriptivism in
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317
the later modern period. Rather than seeing these novels as occurring against a backdrop of the ‘increased acceptance’ of non-standard varieties, it is possible to see them
as participating in the complex debates about correctness, education, artificiality, and
linguistic virtue that were circulating at the time (see Beal, 2004; Hickey, 2010;
Mugglestone, 2003; Ostade, 2008). At the same time, developments in literary studies
have brought fresh perspectives, particularly with the recent emphasis on a ‘four
nations’ or ‘archipelagic’ approach to Romantic Period literature, situating Scots, Irish
and Welsh as significant literary traditions in their own right rather than being peripheral to a mainstream English tradition (see Carruthers and Rawes, 2003; Davis et al.,
2004; Duff and Jones, 2007; Trumpener, 1997). Finally, the literary canon has extended
considerably, bringing additional authors into consideration and thereby expanding the
study of literary dialect beyond a handful of well-known authors. The recent bibliographies of Romantic Period novels created by Garside et al. have been instrumental in
this, allowing scholars for the first time to identify all of the novels published during
the period (Garside et al., 2004; Garside et al., 2000a, 2000b).
The ‘Dialect in British Fiction 1800–1836’ project was devised in order to take advantage of these developments and to provide the basis for a much richer diachronic account
of the development of dialect representation in novels between 1800 and 1836. In Section
2 we discuss some of the vexed issues concerning the appropriate terminology to use to
refer to language varieties during this period; in Section 3 we outline the methodology of
the project; and in Section 4 we summarise and discuss the overall findings from the
project. In Sections 5–8 we investigate Blake’s observations about the trajectories of different varieties focusing on each nation of the British Isles in turn: Scotland, Ireland,
Wales and England. In conclusion we consider what these findings reveal about the
changing role of characters from the lower social orders during this period.
2 Terminology
The labels that commentators use to refer to linguistic varieties are not only fraught with
ideological problems but are also susceptible to misuse if applied anachronistically. To
describe a linguistic variety as a dialect or a language is (unwittingly or otherwise) to
enter into a debate regarding its history, formal qualities and prestige, especially if the
linguistic variety in question is associated with an area that has at some point in its history enjoyed national sovereignty (as is the case with Scotland, Wales and Ireland).
Identifying individual varieties by name is also a potentially contentious issue. Scots is,
in the 21st century, the accepted term for the variety derived from Old English which is
currently used in the Lowland areas of Scotland. Scottish dialect and Scotch are generally discouraged in academic use, for the reason that they frame the variety in Anglocentric
terms: the first, by implying that it is a sub-variety of modern Southern English; the
second, through the use of an English corruption of the Middle Scots term, Scottis. Yet
the picture is a little more complicated than this. Scots, as Corbett et al. point out (2003:
2), comprises not only Broad Scots (a variety distinguished by its distinctive grammar,
lexis and phonology) but also regional sub-varieties of Broad Scots and Scottish Standard
English (a version of southern Standard English, distinguished primarily by its phonology). When modern commentators treat Scots as a discrete and indivisible entity, they
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Language and Literature 22(4)
invite the charge not only of imprecision but also of oversimplifying the language in a
manner consistent with other, more overtly Anglocentric, representations.
It was in the late 18th century that all of these issues – appropriate metalinguistic
nomenclature, the status of Scots as a language, the subdivision of Scots – were beginning to be articulated.2 In the preface to John Jamieson’s Etymological Dictionary of the
Scottish Language, for instance, we find:
I do not hesitate to call that the Scottish Language, which has generally been considered in no
other light than as merely on a level with the different provincial dialects of the English.
Without entering at present into the origin of the former, I am bold to affirm, that it has as just
a claim to the designation of a peculiar language as most of the other languages of Europe.
(Jamieson, 1808: iv)
Such ideas were not alien to British novelists in the 18th and 19th centuries. In
Smollett’s The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker, first published 1771, the Scottish
character of Lishmago suggests that ‘what we generally call the Scottish dialect’ is in
fact a purer branch of Old English than the prestigious variety spoken in southern
England (Smollett, 2008: 222). Despite the fact that such views were occasionally
given voice in the novels of this period, it should not, however, be assumed that they
materially affected the way such linguistic varieties were represented by novelists in
general. When Lishmago speaks, he does so in an undifferentiated ‘Scottish dialect’
which is marked in contrast to the ‘pure English’ of Jery Melford, the characternarrator who recounts their conversation. If we want to understand the indexical values
that specific linguistic varieties are made to carry in the novels of this period, and if we
want to identify broader trends in the way that these linguistic varieties are used, then
it is necessary to refer to national varieties, such as Scots, Irish English and Welsh
English as dialects and to discuss them as single, discrete entities (as opposed to composites of a number of sub-varieties). Thus it is that we group together, under the general rubric of Scots, representations that resemble Scottish Standard English and those
which resemble Broad Scots, without distinguishing between the two. Our simplification of dialectal categories and metalinguistic vocabulary should be understood as a
response to the demands of our material, not as a definitive statement regarding the
history of dialects in Britain. Such a manoeuvre does not preclude the possibility that
researchers might go on to examine, for example, the growing awareness of Scottish
Standard English (as an entity distinct from Broad Scots) on the part of contemporary
novelists. On the contrary, this project aims to facilitate further explorations of more
specific issues within the broader field that we map here.
Similarly, we are aware that by focusing only on varieties of English we ignore the
fact that English was a second language for many Celtic language speakers in Scotland,
Ireland and Wales. In novels aimed at English-speaking audiences there was a tendency
to gloss over this because of the difficulties inherent in representing extensive speech in
Gaelic or Welsh. Nevertheless, some authors do signal Celtic identities through the inclusion of Gaelic or Welsh vocabulary and other markers (typically discourse markers and
phonological elements) within the context of a dialect speaker’s utterance. Again, this is
not a topic that we address specifically here, but it is one that this project should open up
for investigation.
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Finally, we commit a deliberate anachronism throughout this study insofar as we refer
to ‘Standard English’. This label did not, of course, exist in the early 19th century. But
the 19th-century alternatives: ‘English’, ‘pure English’ or ‘correct English’ are, we feel,
too imprecise or overtly evaluative to be workable, and therefore ‘Standard English’ is
the best of an unsatisfactory set of options.
3 Methodology
There were two parts to the ‘Dialect in British Fiction 1800–1836 project’: the survey
and the database. For the survey we took as our starting point two of Garside et al.’s
bibliographies: The English Novel 1770–1829: A Bibliographical Survey of Prose Fiction
Published in the British Isles: Volume II, 1800–1829 (2000b) and The English Novel,
1830–1836: A Bibliographical Survey of Fiction Published in the British Isles (2004).
We examined all of the available novels listed per year at four-year intervals, that is, all
the novels from 1800, 1804, 1808, 1812, and so on. Around 80 novels were published in
each of these years, ranging from a peak of 111 in 1808 to a low of 59 in 1816. Some
novels in each of the target years were not available to us, either because there is no
extant copy of the recorded novel, or because they are held in libraries which we could
not access. For each year, however, we were able to consult between 73% and 96% of the
recorded novels, and we have no grounds for believing the unavailable novels show a
different pattern of dialect representation from those that were available. Each novel was
assigned a ‘dialect rating’ on the following basis:
• One star: No character is represented as speaking dialect, no metalinguistic comments upon language variety.
• Two stars: There are one or two instances (fewer than 10 lines total) where
some language variation is marked. This is not extensive or detailed, and may
not be specific to region. There may be one or two comments about language
variation.
• Three stars: One or more characters speak dialect, and that dialect is represented
in some detail. The total amount of dialect representation is more than 10 lines but
less than 100. There may be several comments upon language variety.
• Four stars: Either one character speaks dialect very extensively, or several characters speak dialect. The total amount of dialect representation is more than 100
lines. There may be frequent and/or extensive comments upon language variety.
In addition, the survey also recorded which dialects were represented for more than 10
lines in each 3-star and 4-star novel.
In the second part of the project, the 10 novels rated most highly for dialect for each
target year were analysed for inclusion in the Database of Dialect of British Fiction
1800–1836. Here a much more detailed record was made for each novel concerning
genre, plot, geographical locations and character background. Samples of dialect representation were collected and tagged. The result is a database that contains well-known
novels by writers such as Scott and Edgeworth, but also contains many novels by littleknown or anonymous authors.
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Language and Literature 22(4)
Taken as a whole there are two particularly innovative aspects in the way this project
approaches dialect literature. The first is that it has a strong diachronic element embedded within it. Because it moves forward in regular increments of four years, it enables us
to track change over time within both the survey and the database. Within the survey, the
records for each novel are necessarily brief, but because the survey is comprehensive we
are able to track the overall quantity of dialect representation in the period, as well as the
quantity of specific dialects. The database is more selective and therefore not representative of the period as a whole. Nevertheless, because it records more detailed information
about 10 novels from each of the target years, it enables us to trace developments within
specific dialects, genres, character types, and so forth.
The second innovative aspect of the project is the fact that it treats all novels equally,
making no assumptions about which texts and authors are significant for the development
of dialect representation. It might be objected that this results in an idiosyncratic account of
literary history, where marginal and little-read novels are given the same weight as established and influential classics. However, we argue that this inclusive approach provides a
useful counterbalance to the prevailing tendency to tell the history of dialect representation
in fiction through canonical authors alone. The result is a less discontinuous and more
detailed narrative of the history of dialect representation, as well as a better understanding
of the context within which the canonical texts were written and published.
In each of the five sections (4–8) that follow we first outline the quantitative findings
from the survey part of the project and then adopt a more discursive and qualitative
approach in order to interpret those findings in the light of our reading of the novels.
4 Overall results
Figure 1 presents an overview of the findings from the survey part of the project, recording how many novels rated 3-star or 4-star for quantity of dialect representation were
identified per year. The graph in Figure 1 demonstrates that there was an increase in the
quantity of dialect representation across the period. During the first three target years
(1800, 1804, 1808) 15–18% of novels were rated 3-star or 4-star; by the final three target
years (1828, 1832, 1836) 29–35% of novels were rated 3-star or 4-star. Overall, therefore, our findings support Blake’s claim that 1800–1836 saw an increase in the total
quantity of literary dialect that was being produced within the British Isles.
It is possible to provide external explanations for the increase, such as the one offered
by Blake, that non-standard varieties of English were becoming more acceptable during
this period. The problem with such explanations is that they imply that literary dialects
are a natural part of the novel, and that once barriers to their inclusion – prejudice against
them – are removed, their quantity automatically increases. There is also some danger of
circularity: dialect representation in novels proliferated because dialects were becoming
more acceptable; and we know that dialects were becoming more acceptable because
their representation in novels proliferated.
It is perhaps more useful to ask what new functions literary dialects acquired during
the period, and here we turn to the qualitative part of our discussion. During the early part
of the period, the novels that represent dialect are typically satires or fictional autobiographies. In these novels dialect-speaking characters are part of the cross-section of
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Hodson and Broadhead
Percentage of novels
40%
35%
30%
25%
3 star
20%
4 star
15%
10%
5%
0%
1800
1804
1808
1812
1816 1820
Year
1824
1828
1832
1836
Figure 1. Percentage of novels scoring 3 stars or 4 stars out of the total number examined for
each of the target years (rounded to nearest integer).
society the hero encounters. The dialect-speaking characters are depicted in broad brush
strokes and their dialect is represented through a narrow range of highly stereotypical
features. Even such limited representation is rare, however, because so many of the novels from the period do not involve any dialect speakers at all. Genre plays a role in this:
gothic novels and romances make up between a third and half of the total publications in
1800, 1804 and 1808. Novels of this type are almost always set in continental Europe and
peopled with characters who are purportedly speaking languages other than English.
There is thus little reason for authors to attempt to represent different varieties of English.
Furthermore, novels of this type focus on characters drawn from the upper echelons of
society. When the lower orders are called upon to deliver crucial plot points, their speech
is rendered indirectly, obviating the need to indicate anything about speech style. Just
occasionally the direct speech of a minor servant is rendered directly, as in this example
from the anonymous The Mysterious Penitent (1800):
Lady Villerverde, before she went down to dinner, ordered the postilion into her dressing room,
to interrogate him more particularly concerning the gentleman who had saved her daughter; in
answer to her questions, the fellow replied,
‘I cant say, your ladyship, as I knows much about un, but grandmother, who lives wi un, knows
more nur I does.’
‘Your parent lives with the gentleman then?’
‘Yes, she and little sister, my Lady; grandmother cant walk, so sister went to help her.’ (Anon.,
1800: I, 112–113)
Such moments are tantalising because they demonstrate that on occasion authors could
feel motivated to represent the speech of lower servants, that when they did so they
sometimes felt the need to mark the servant speech as qualitatively different from the
speech of the main characters, and that they had some repertoire for doing such representations. Yet there is nothing in the speech representation to indicate a specific regional
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Language and Literature 22(4)
18
16
Percentage of novels
14
12
Scosh
10
Irish
8
Welsh
6
4
2
0
1800
1804
1808
1812
1816 1820
Year
1824
1828
1832
1836
Figure 2. Percentage of novels out of the total number examined that feature at least one
Scots, Irish English or Welsh English speaking character who speaks for more than 10 lines
(rounded to nearest integer).
identity. Rather, the representation signals the socioeconomic standing of the speaker
through its stigmatised non-standard concordance (‘I knows’, ‘more nur I does’), nonstandard closed class words (‘un’ for ‘him’, ‘nur’ for ‘than’) and clipping (‘wi’ for
‘with’). This is a passing moment in a novel otherwise written in Standard English and
the author evinces no further interest in the nameless postilion.
Later in the period, gothic tales and romances become less frequent and novels are
increasingly located in specific locations within the British Isles. Characters from the
lower social orders appear more regularly, and are afforded more opportunities for direct
speech. However this does not happen in a uniform manner across all dialects. In order
to gain some insight into these processes in the next sections we focus the four major
national varieties of the British Isles. For reasons of space we do not here consider extraterritorial varieties of English such as Jamaican English and Indian English although
such varieties are included in the database.
5 Scots
Figure 2 supports Blake’s claims that the representation of Scots became widespread
during this period. It shows that the percentage of novels that scores 3 stars or 4 stars and
includes a Scots character who speaks more than 10 lines ranges from 0% to 4% for each
target year up to and including 1812, then jumps rapidly to 14–16% up to and including
1824, and then tails off slightly to 11% at the end of the period. Hence, Scott’s Waverley
in 1814 appeared at the vanguard of a flurry of Scottish-set national tales featuring Scotsspeaking characters. This raises the question of whether Scott’s popularity created this
trend, or whether he benefited from conditions that were particularly receptive to the
kinds of novel that he wrote. This question is perhaps unanswerable, but it is worth
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323
noting, as Blake does, that the existing Scots literary tradition and the popularity of
Robert Burns had trained the English public to read Scots in a way that they were not
prepared to read any other variety of English (1981: 137).
As we noted earlier, novels of the period typically assume a simple binary distinction
between the Standard English of the narrative voice and main characters and the Scots
spoken by any Scottish character from the lower social orders. Robert Bisset’s Douglas,
or the Highlander (1800) is a case in point: the eponymous hero is represented as speaking Standard English throughout, despite the fact that a throwaway comment midway
through the novel suggests that his home language is Gaelic, while a later comment suggests that he speaks with a Scottish accent until he learns to modify it when studying in
London. Despite these simplifications, when Bisset does choose to represent characters
as speaking Scots the representation is fairly detailed:
‘An’ please your honour, there is na a man in the hale army mair milder than yoursell, and de’ll
a stronger man, or a better feighter there is in it, na in our ain old forty second itsell, tho’ mony
a clever fallow there is in it; however, sin your honour will hae’d sae, I’ll teach the lawdie the
gude braid sword. Charlie Macavig and I very after taaks a bout at it, that gars us mind auld lang
syne, when we followed your honour up the heights of Abrahaam. –Ah, these were bra’ times.
By G-d, gin that brave boy live to man’s estate, he’ll be as stout a tall well-bigget a man as your
honour’s sell.’ (Bisset, 1800: I, 68)
Although a few of these features were stigmatised as ungrammatical during the period
(e.g. the double comparative ‘mair milder’) the representation serves primarily to highlight the differences between English and Scots. Scots is represented by a mix of vocabulary (‘auld lang syne’, ‘braid sword’, ‘well-bigget’); respelling (‘feighter’, ‘ain’,
‘lawdie’); grammatical features such as the negative particle ‘na’; and blasphemous
oaths (‘By G-d’). It is significant too that this fleeting appearance of the Captain marks
him as a moral character, not a source of comedy. Nevertheless, his main role is to comment on the military prowess of the central character and he has no storyline of his own.
Novels such as Douglas suggest that the representation of Scots as a literary tool for
characterisation and social commentary was available in 1800, but that writers were not
motivated to incorporate it more extensively into the novel.
What Scott and his contemporaries were to accomplish from 1814 onwards was the
integration of Scots speakers into British fiction and an exploration of the possibilities
this afforded. There is not space to explore these developments fully here, but one example is Robert Mudie’s Glenfergus (1820), which presents a striking contrast to Douglas.
It portrays a range of Scots-speaking characters such as Rachel, who, in the following
extract, is in conversation with Amelia, a young woman of Scottish ancestry who has
been brought up in London:
‘I am astonished,’ said Rachel, ‘that you wha hae been bred at Lunnon, and seen sae little a’ our
countra ways, shud ken sae weel what I say. I mith maybe speak English mysel’, and I daresay
I could; but, waes me! maist naebody here wad understand it but the minister, and he likes the
Scots just as weel, and Mr Allan; an’ its no ilka day a body can get a sight o’ him, he’s aye sae
bizzy wi’ his books. Forbye, I hae been sae lang accustomed to the Scots that fouk wad think
me pridefu’ gin I waur to begin the English.’
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Amelia assured her companion, that she not only understood, but liked the Scotch.
‘To be sure, ye’re Scots yoursel’ baieth faither and mither,’ said Rachel. (1820: I, 337–338)
There is not perhaps much difference in the dialect representation itself here as compared to Bisset’s Douglas. What is significant, however, is the fact that Rachel has a
viewpoint and extended storyline of her own, reflects explicitly on her own decision to
use Scots and compliments the comprehension skills of her Standard English speaking
interlocutor. Amelia, meanwhile, converses with Rachel on equal terms and has made
a particular effort to learn Scots in order to dispense charity successfully to the peasants. Scots is here used not for single characters who exist only in relation to Standard
English speakers, but to portray a complex web of social relationships in and around a
small village.
6 Irish English
Figure 2 shows that Irish English, like Scots, underwent a sharp increase although this
occurred a few years later. Irish English does not exceed 5% until 1828 when it sharply
increases and remains at 11–12% in 1828, 1832 and 1836. This suggests that while
Castle Rackrent may have proved influential for later novelists, it did not herald an
immediate influx of Irish English speakers in British novels. Blake notes that Irish
English was in a very different position from Scots at the turn of the 18th century: ‘There
were no serious works in Irish English known to the average English reader, and the
attitude towards the Irish hardly encouraged Englishmen to regard them as civilized or
sophisticated’ (1981: 137). Certainly no one was claiming that Irish English was a language in its own right or writing dictionaries of Irish English. In novels at the start of the
period, representations of Irish speakers tend to be comic, and to display a relatively
limited number of features. In Horace Smith’s The Runaway (1800), for example, an
Irish officer steps in to ascertain the safety of a young lady:
‘Not in the street, by Jasus!’ cried an Irish officer who had witnessed the preceding scene; ‘you
had better go home with the lady abbess.’
‘Indeed, I want none of his company,’ said the old lady; at the same time repeating her request
that the coachman would drive on.
‘There may be some mistake,’ cried the Irish officer; ‘give me lave, I will spake to the young
woman:’ then turning to Clarissa, ‘Has she offered you a fair price?’ said he.
‘Indeed, gentleman,’ replied Clarissa, greatly terrified at the appearance of the crowd, ‘she has
agreed to give me all I asked, and I am perfectly satisfied.’
‘Oh, by saint Patrick,’ cried the officer, ‘it is a fair bargain; and let me see the man that dares be
after attempting to take the old lady’s goods out of her hands.’ (1800: I, 56–57)
The Irish officer is an upright man, but the scene is based upon a comic misunderstanding and his speech serves to underscore that comedy: the young lady believes that she is
being protected by an abbess when in fact she has agreed to enter a brothel. In terms of
representation, the Irish officer’s speech is marked as dialectal much more sparsely than
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the captain’s speech in Douglas and the features in question are relatively circumscribed:
respelling of [i:] to [ei] (‘Jasus’, ‘lave’, ‘spake’); a single grammatical feature (‘be after
attempting’) blasphemous oaths (‘by Jasus’, ‘by saint Patrick’).
It is not, of course, the case that greater linguistic detail always results in a qualitatively better dialect representation.3 Nevertheless, as the number of literary representations of Irish English increase from 1824 onwards it is possible to find writers searching
for ways to enrich their representations of Irish English:
‘Arra cushla-ma-chree, is it yourself that’s there, stretched on the corp of your own dear father;
och, och, its a black day for you a vourneen, and for us all. Look up, jewel, and see who’s by
you, acushla, one that loves the ground you walk on; that nursed you at her own breast and gave
you the veins of her heart to feed on.’ (Anon. [a], 1828: 212)
‘Well, Shamus,’ said he who seemed the more authoritative of the two, addressing his companion
in an under tone; ‘now that we have our dinner ate an all, what are we to do next?’
‘To pay for it, Morty, I’m thinkin.’
‘That’s aisier said than done. How much have you?’
‘Sarrow cross.’
‘An it’s the same way with meself. We’ll be skivered alive before we lave the place. What’ll we
do at all?’
‘How duv I know?’
That’s just the way with you always. You’re never any good for thinkin of a hap’orth. How well
you thought o’ comin in an atin it.’ (Griffin, 1836: I, 61–62)
In the first example, from Edmund O’Hara (Anon. [a], 1828), Gaelic vocabulary (‘vourneen’, ‘acushla’) is incorporated into the speech of the old nurse Nancy. In the second
example from The Duke of Monmouth (1836) some stereotypical Irish features remain
including [i:] for [ei] (‘lave’, ‘atin’) and clipping (‘thinkin’, ‘o’’). But vocabulary items
are also introduced (‘skivered’) and there is a nuanced use of word order (‘I’m thinkin’,
‘How much have you?’) to indicate voice (a feature which it borrows from Castle
Rackrent). It is also noticeable in The Duke of Monmouth that while the characters of
Shamus and Morty are to some extent comic, they are afforded a significant subplot
within the novel, finding themselves on opposite sides of the rebellion. Indeed, while
Irish English may have lacked the linguistic and literary history of Scots, the political
situation during this period ensured that both Ireland itself and Irish characters provided
fertile ground for literary representations. Many of the novels in the database that feature
Irish English are politically inflected, as in the case of Anglo-Irish of the Nineteenth
Century (1828) and The Cruise of the Midge (1836).
7 Welsh English
The representation of Welsh English in novels published between 1800 and 1836 demonstrates a strikingly different pattern. In comparison with the increase in representations
of Scots and Irish English, the already infrequent representations of Welsh English dry
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up in the latter part of the period. The absence of Wales from the literature of the period
is explicitly commented upon by Joseph Downes. In the preface to his 1836 novel The
Mountain Decameron Downes asks why Wales ‘exhibits a total blank in British literature’ (1836: iv). Downes is referring to literature in general rather than dialect in literature, but he confirms the fact that the absence of Welsh literature was apparent to some
contemporary readers, even if he himself was at a loss to explain it. In fact our project
surveyed a small number of novels which, from their titles, had the potential to be nationalist Welsh tales, including Griffiths ap Griffiths’s The Sons of St. David (1816) and the
anonymous The Mortimers, or the Vale of Machynllaeth (Anon. [b], 1828). Yet none of
these contain any representation of Welsh English. On the few occasions when Welsh
English is represented it tends to be highly stereotypical, as in Headlong Hall (1816):
‘Cot pless your honour! I should n’t have thought of meeting any pody here at this time of the
morning, except, look you, it was the tevil –who, to pe sure, toes not often come upon
consecrated cround – put for all that, I think I have seen him now and then, in former tays, when
old Nanny Llwyd of Llyn-isa was living– Cot teliver us! (Peacock, 1816: 128–129)
At the heart of this representation is the devoicing on stopped consonants, so that [b]
becomes [p], [d] becomes [t] and [g] becomes [k] plus a small number of discourse markers, including ‘look you’. Peacock thus draws on a repertoire that dated back to at least
Shakespeare’s day, and there is no evidence of any author in the database attempting to
expand the representation of Welsh English.
The most obvious explanation for why Welsh English did not attract more attention
from novelists is perhaps that the Welsh language continued to thrive and that the literary
tradition in Wales was written in Welsh and not in Welsh English. As a result, no existing
dialect literature had established the conventions for other writers to draw on. More than
that, however, writers seem to have had comparatively little interest in Wales during this
period, possibly because of its greater political stability. Therefore there was little motivation to develop less stereotypical representations of Welsh English.
8 London English and Regional English
The figures for representations of English dialects are rather more complicated to analyse for two reasons. The first complication is that it is often difficult to distinguish
between a regional variety that is specific as to place and a social variety that indexes
class alone. The second complication is that because these are regional rather than
national varieties it is more difficult to group them in satisfactory ways. For the purposes
of this article we have drawn a simple distinction between ‘London English’ and
‘Regional Englishes’. However, what we have termed ‘Regional Englishes’ are a very
mixed bag, including varieties associated with cities, counties and wider geographical
areas (e.g. Manchester, Yorkshire, West Country). These different varieties have quite
different literary trajectories that are not well served by homogenising them.
Despite these limitations, Figure 3 provides support for Blake’s claims that representations of English varieties did not emerge strongly until the Victorian period. In the case
of London English there is no clear pattern and the figures remain low throughout,
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327
Hodson and Broadhead
12
Percentage of novels
10
8
London English
6
Regional English
4
2
0
1800 1804 1808 1812 1816 1820 1824 1828 1832 1836
Year
Figure 3. Percentage of novels out of the total number examined that feature at least one
London English or Regional English speaking character who speaks for more than 10 lines
(rounded to nearest integer).
although the rise to 9% at the end of the period may signal the start of increasing popularity. None of the novels we surveyed includes a major London English speaking character.
When London English is represented it is typically through a narrow set of features:
‘Here, Sir, in a hinstant,’ said the man, who was descended from a very remarkable tribe of the
human race denominated Cockneys, and who still retained some of the peculiarities of his
forefathers. …
‘Vy, Sir, you don’t s’ppose as how I am a going to defile my coach with a voman all dreeping
with much!’(Anon., 1836: 87)
Mrs Maberly is set in the future, and uses a stereotypical set of features to represent a
minor servant character, including h-insertion (‘a hinstant’); v/w transposition (‘Vy’,
‘voman’) and a-prefixing ‘a going’. London English is primarily a matter of social placing, and it is hard to imagine a character learning London English in order to dispense
charity better to the poor, as Amelia learns Scots in Glenfergus.
In the case of Regional Englishes, Figure 3 reveals a very different pattern to that
observed for Scots and Irish English in Figure 2, with representations of Regional
Englishes reaching a low point of 2% in 1828 but beginning to climb thereafter. Thus it
would appear that the increased representation of Scots and Irish English occurred if
anything at the expense of Regional English representations in the short term, even if in
the longer term they proved influential.
A few novels stand out for their detailed portrayals of specific characters through
regional dialects, as with the elderly Derbyshire servant Frank Feldfair in the prefatory
section of Craven Derby:
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Language and Literature 22(4)
‘Noy, noy, young gentleman, you be prankish as uzual; you be after making me a score yearz
younger than I am,’ said the good old man, his grey eye lit up with pleasure at the condescending
and friendly greeting he had received. ‘Age must creep on us all, it goes not back, thof the
zoight of thee, Maizter Craven, makes me feel again the vigour I have lost in the progressun
loike of ten long yeerz.’ (?Deale/?Luttrell, 1832: I, 6)
Frank’s dialect is represented through generic rustic features rather than anything specifically Worcestershire (voicing of fricatives [z] for [s] in ‘uzual’ and ‘zoight’, [oi] for [ai]
in ‘loike’ and ‘zoight’, archaic form of ‘though’ with ‘thof’). The encounter between
Frank and his master is only a frame to introduce the main narrative, which is a historical
romance and contains very little dialect speech. Nevertheless, this level of attention to an
English servant character is rare even in 1832. Frank is named, speaks at some length and
has some authority owing to his position as valued family retainer who remembers the
old days. In many ways the novel is suggestive of a transitional stage, hinting at the possibilities that a character such as Frank might offer when integrated into the novel as a
whole.
9 Conclusion
The findings from the ‘Dialect in British Fiction 1800–1836’ project support Blake’s
observations that the different national varieties of English in the British Isles developed
at very different rates. Although Edgeworth’s Irish English representation in Castle
Rackrent may have been inspirational for later writers, it was Scots that led the way for
the development of dialect representation within British Fiction. Irish English followed
suit relatively quickly, but literary representations of Welsh English diminished and
London and Regional Englishes only began to take off at the end of this period.
Two factors are key in explaining this pattern. The first is that, unsurprisingly, a variety such as Scots, which had an existing literary and linguistic heritage, developed a
range of fictional functions much more quickly than other varieties such as Irish and
Welsh English. However, this is only one part of the story. A second factor is that a motivation was required to prompt authors to incorporate dialect-speaking characters into
their fiction. Neither Irish nor Welsh English had the strong literary tradition that Scots
boasted, yet Irish English developed quickly while Welsh English did not, most likely in
response to the greater political interest that Ireland held during this period.
And yet if it were only a matter of linguistic familiarity and political interest, it might
be asked why London English proved so laggard. After all, many writers and readers
lived in and around London and would have had the opportunity to observe the speech of
the lower orders on a daily basis, and those lower orders surely provided ample opportunity for political commentary, as Dickens was shortly to demonstrate. It is worth considering Scott’s own explanation of the appeal of Scots. In the preface to The Antiquary
Scott explicitly links his own desire to represent characters from the lower orders to
Wordsworth’s call for the ‘language of real men’:
I have, in the last two narratives [Guy Mannering and The Antiquary] especially, sought my
principal personages in the class of society who are the last to feel the influences of that general
polish which assimilates to each other the manners of different nations. Among the same class
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I have placed some of the scenes, in which I have endeavoured to illustrate the operation of the
higher and more violent passions; both because the lower orders are less restrained by the habit
of suppressing their feelings, and because I agree with Mr. Wordsworth, that they seldom fail to
express them in the strongest and most powerful language. This is, I think, peculiarly the case
with the peasantry of my own country, a class with whom I have long been familiar. The antique
force and simplicity of their language, often tinctured with the oriental eloquence of Scripture,
in the mouths of those of an elevated understanding, give pathos to their grief, and dignity to
their resentment. (1816: I, v–vii)
What is noticeable here is how insistently Scott values the speech of the Scottish peasants in terms that place them in a historical past: they are ‘the last’ to experience contemporary influences, their language has ‘antique force’ and ‘the oriental eloquence of
Scripture’. Scottish peasants, in short, are noble savages whose geographical and social
remoteness have insulated their speech from the modern age. Scott’s peasants might be a
significant step forward from the nameless postilion in The Mysterious Penitent who
exists only to advance her ladyship’s narrative arc. Nevertheless, their grief and resentment are only worthy of literary representation if their ‘elevated understanding’ ensures
that they do so with aesthetically pleasing ‘pathos’ and ‘dignity’. Such a positioning does
not place Scots speakers on a par with Standard English speakers; rather it isolates them
as living relics of a bygone age. At the same time, it offers little opportunity for more
geographically and socially proximate speakers from the lower orders to have their
voices heard in fiction.4
The increase in dialect in fiction 1800–1836 was a significant development in terms
of the visibility of characters drawn from the lower orders of society. However, the
meaning of that increased visibility is not straightforward to interpret, and it is important to be wary of celebrating the development of dialect representation in the novel as
de facto evidence of increased acceptability for dialect and dialect speakers. The
‘Dialect in British Fiction 1800–1836’ project has, we hope, opened the way for further
research into the dynamics of literary dialect representation during this period of rapid
change.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the research undertaken by Dr Julie Millward who was a
research assistant on the project and the assistance of the Humanities Resarch Institute at the
University of Sheffield in providing technical expertise to the project.
Funding
This work was supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council of the UK, grant number
12158.
Notes
1. Graham Shorrocks draws an important distinction between ‘dialect literature’, which is written primarily in dialect for a local audience and ‘literary dialect’, which is written primarily in
Standard English for a national or international audience (1996). The focus of this article is on
literary dialect although much work remains to be done on the relationship between literary
dialect and dialect literature.
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2. See Charles Jones, A Language Suppressed: The Pronunciation of the Scots Language in the
Eighteenth Century (1995) for an account of the rise of Scottish Standard English. Penny
Fielding, in Scotland and the Fictions of Geography (2008), discusses the debate surrounding
the historical status of Scots as a dialect.
3. See for example Michael Toolan’s discussion of ‘reader resistance’ to any ‘rendered speech
that departs to any appreciable degree from standard colloquial speech’ (1992: 34) or Jaffe
and Walton’s observation that detailed orthographic representations of dialect ‘require too
much investment and decoding to allow voice to come through’ (2000: 583).
4. See Marina Dossena Scotticisms in Grammar and Vocabulary (2005) for a more detailed
discussion of the tendency of 19th-century commentators to associate Scots with a lost rural
past.
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Author biographies
Jane Hodson is Senior Lecturer in English Language and Literature at the University of Sheffield
in the UK. She completed a doctorate at the University of Cambridge, which was published as The
Politics of Style: Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine and Godwin (Ashgate, 2007). Her current research
interests focus on the way in which dialects of English are represented in literature. In 2013 she
organised the International Conference in Dialect and Literature at the University of Sheffield. Her
next monograph, Dialect in Film and Literature will be published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2014.
She is also editing a collection of essays Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century, to
be published by Ashgate.
Alex Broadhead is a university teacher in the English department at the University of Liverpool.
His first monograph, The Language of Robert Burns: Style, Ideology and Identity, will be published by Bucknell University Press in late 2013. His research focuses on issues of language and
dialect in 18th- and 19th-century literature, and he has published work on the writing of William
Wordsworth and Josiah Relph. He is currently in the early stages of writing a monograph on nonstandard language in Romantic poetry.
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