Oh damn ...

[snorkackcatcher]

Just seen the transcript of that JKR interview:

JKR: I think the thing that I find most extraordinary is - I don't know how many characters I have in play now - how do you find voices for them?
SF: It's not a simple thing to answer. I mean, so often they're there and I hope that, generally speaking, I've...if not given exactly the voice you imagine, that it's somewhere in that area. I mean, there are characters like Tonks which, for some reason, I just instinctively felt she had that slightly sort of Burnley, you know, sort of Jane Horrocks sort of accent. [JKR laughs] And it just seemed to fit her exactly.
JKR: It does, yeah.
...
SF: And yet you did, there's no kind of "put wood in th'ole..."
JKR: No.
SF: And bar that kind of Northern writing it ... It's just something that's there.

Tonks with a Northern accent? Not the semi-Cockney-if-anything-at-all I (and most other people it seems, to be honest) went for on the basis of that 'Wotcher'?

Bugger. :)

Oh well. Of all the things she could have said that would leave my riffing on her world looking the worse for wear, that one's pretty minor. It's just that in the next (nearly finished) chapter of said riffing, there's a character with 'one of the broadest Northern accents Tonks had ever heard' ... :)

Comments

[catkind.livejournal.com]

Hmm, yes, I had Tonks down as chirpy Cockney too.

I am a lot happier for knowing that Hagrid is supposed to be West Country though - not that I'd have guessed from the way he's written, but at least I now know how to read him in my head.

It was a fascinating conversation to listen to, though. Stephen Fry is someone I admire hugely. I'll have to get hold of his recordings sometime when I'm feeling rich.

[snorkackcatcher]

Yeah, I'd quite like to hear the audio versions. Of course, I suppose I'd have to get a DVD player first ...

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't call the audio books canon, exactly, and JKR didn't actually say this was the accent she originally had in mind for Tonks -- just that it suited her. I think you're in the clear.

[snorkackcatcher]

Yeah, and it's way too late to change now anyway. It was just one of those ::doubletake:: moments. If I ever do a revised version (SQ?) I might include a line saying Ted came from up North originally but had now been living in London for quite a while. :)

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Believe me, you do not want to hear Stephen Fry's version of a Northern accent. Patronising old horror.

[snorkackcatcher]

Oops ... I have a feeling my version may be even worse. :)

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Believe me - nothing's worse - besides I don't suppose for a minute that you are a patronising old horror.

If it makes you feel any better, I'm told that my cod-Cockney is truly a thing of horror.

[lazy-neutrino.livejournal.com]

I was listening to that with my boyfriend. At that bit I said 'I always thought she was slightly Cockney.' 'So did I,' he said. And yeah, that 'Wotcher' is not a northern thing.

Just a quick suggestion - you might want to change the word 'Northern' to something more specific, e.g Yorkshire or Geordie? Or from the NW you might want to distinguish between e.g. Scouse and Lancahsire. Just because most people can identify the sub-accents to some extent: I would never think of a 'Northern' accent, for example, so the phrasing didn't work for me. But just a suggestion, as I say. What particular North are you thinking of?

[snorkackcatcher]

I must try to listen to it -- it's just that radio reception in my flat is abysmal (too many buildings around) and I only use a dialup connection so streaming audio is pretty awful as well. :)

As for why I said 'Northern' -- I mentally have the character down as a Yorkshireman, but for some idiotic reason placed his home in Lancashire earlier on, and so was trying to fuzz it! I was probably banking on non-UK readers not being able to tell what the difference was! I may just say Yorkshire and hope no-one calls me on it, especially as I'd quite like to vaguely suggest that he was one of the people talking in the Hog's Head in OotP. :)

[jesspallas.livejournal.com]

You know when I was writing Oblivious, I actually asked my beta to "check Tonks cockney accent". However as a listener to the audio books, she came back with "Tonks is a Yorkshire lass" which came as rather a surprise to me! I just can't reconcile Tonks as being from Yorkshire in my head and so I just assumed it was a Stephen Fry thing and stuck with what I imagined. It's a bit disconcerting to find JKR agreeing but I'm going to cling to the fact that she only said it could sound right and not that it was. Tonks' voice is too ingrained in my head to change now...

I wish I hadn't said her dad was from Kent in the last chapter though! ;)

[snorkackcatcher]

I'm going to cling to the fact that she only said it could sound right and not that it was

Same here. :) I'm just glad she's never answered that 'open letter' question about Tonks' age -- because after HBP and Bella being the oldest Black sister, I'm fairly sure I made Tonks a couple of years too old by giving her a gap between leaving school and starting Auror training. (However I juggle the figures, I can't really reconcile the data with those extra couple of years without resorting to TeenagePregnancy!Andromeda, and even then I'm pushing it.)

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I have always assumed that Tonks's accent is the result of massive over-compensation, hence it wanders between fashionable working-class accents as required.

[snorkackcatcher]

Ee ba gum, now that would be the perfect solution, guv'nor! :D

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Ay, that it be, to be sure, to be sure.