Foreign Dialects: A Manual for Actors, Directors and Writers

Thirty of the principal foreign dialects of the various national groups are given, with character studies, speech peculiarities, and examples of the dialects in easily-read phonetic monologs. Some of the dialects included are Cockney, British, Irish, Scottish, French, German, Spanish, Swedish, Polish, Greek and Yiddish. There are also dialects brought into prominence by World War II - Australian slang and Australian pidgin, Japanese, Chinese, Russian, Beche le Mar, and Pidgin English. Foreign Dialects contains an extensive dialect repertoire which will assist the actor in the preparation of the most difficult roles. It will give the director of producer a quick, convenient aid in correcting actors in their roles and evaluating applicants for authenticity and dialect ability. It will give the dramatic coach a combined text and source book for training students for foreign character roles. And it will give the writer authentic dialogue which will guide him in the writing of fiction, radio or movie and TV scripts. For the teacher there are musical inflection graphs, an important aid in accuracy, which sho exactly the pace and pitch of deliver of various dialects: for the student, a new simplified visual phonetic system which graphically reproduces speech patterns.