More troubles with reciting dialogue.
Bardelys remained staunchly impressed, nay, in awe, of Karen Savage and her reading of the Baroness Orczy’s The Elusive Pimpernel. And yet he found a problem – not indeed with the performance, but with the writing from 100 years before.
In short, dialogue written for the page presents grave difficulties to the oral reciter.
In person, the oral talesman has several tools with which to substitute for the clever punctuation marks developed over the centuries to represent and mark off dialogue. The oral talesman when he stands before you, can turn to the right when he gives one character’s lines, and to the left when he gives another; he can vary his facial expression; he can alter his poster and bearing; he can play tricks with his voice.
When the oral talesman recites over the radio, or on record, he is left with only his voice. And so it is with voice alone that the redoubtable Ms Savage must represent the distinctions between speakers. In the following passage, reprinted from the fourth chapter of the book, several speakers are discussing the mysterious figure of the Scarlet Pimpernel at the Richmond Gala fair.
Bardelys did have a couple of moments listening to the passage where he wasn’t entirely sure who spoke what. To remove all the punctuation distinctions, he set it all down as it must be spoken:
Say what? commented Johnny Cullen, the apprentice. Who this mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel is. Perhaps he isn't, said old Clutterbuck, who was clerk of the vestry at the church of St. John's the Evangelist. Yes! he added sententiously, for he was fond of his own sayings and usually liked to repeat them before he had quite done with them, that's it, you may be sure. Perhaps he isn't. What do you mean, Master Clutterbuck? asked Ursula Quekett, for she knew the old man liked to explain his wise saws, and as she wanted to marry his son, she indulged him whenever she could. What do you mean? He isn't what? He isn't. That's all, explained Clutterbuck with vague solemnity. Then seeing that he had gained the attention of the little party round him, he condescended to come to more logical phraseology. I mean, that perhaps we must not ask, who IS this mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel? but who WAS that poor and unfortunate gentleman? Then you think, suggested Mistress Polly, who felt unaccountably low-spirited at this oratorical pronouncement. I have it for a fact, said Mr. Clutterbuck solemnly, that he whom they call the Scarlet Pimpernel no longer exists now: that he was collared by the Frenchies, as far back as last fall, and in the language of the poets, has never been heard of no more.
You can see the difficulty. Had the Baroness Orczy written with radio (or podcast or audiobook) in mind, she would have, and should have, interjected a lot more ‘attributions’ to the lines.
Each and every line of dialogue must be clearly marked off, in the text itself, in words, to let the audience know who said it.
The only exception comes when a scene is presented in which there are only two speakers, and the lines are quite short. When each speaker gives no more than one line, in rapid alternation, the result is a lyric, a sort of poetry or song of chant and response, whose rhythm (so long as it remains unbroken) leaves no doubt as to who says what.
It also can help in an interrogation scene: where only one party asks, and only one answers, then the audience can rely upon the form of the sentence to identify the speaker.
Also, as a sort of sub-set of the interrogation scene, Bardelys had to add the scene in which one character knows a good deal more than the other.
Finally, Bardelys was minded of dialogue that was written ‘in dialect’ – a practice much used in 1908 and before, but currently out of favor. But in oral talesmanship, where the lines are to be performed, such dialectical differences can mark off the different speakers. And it is not to be thought of, Bardelys imagined, that an oral talesman, a mountebank performer, should deliver lines of servant and master, townsman and country-man, foreigner and native-born, in one and the same manner for all.
(Composed on keyboard Thursday 2 October 2008)
