Escape Artists
Administrivia => Escape Artists, Inc. => Topic started by: zonebob on October 19, 2013, 06:56:56 PM
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Hi, I've been listening to EP since about episode 88, and PC since the beginning. When I heard the recent metacast, I signed up for a subscription right away. Of course I like some stories better than others, but the only thing I think needs major improvement is pronunciation. For example, in a recent episode "Zenith"was pronounced with a short "e" sound, and not long ago someone pronounced "plague" as "plaw-goo". Maybe readers could be supplied with resources for looking up words they don't know. Of course many people who do a lot of reading have words they've pronounced in their heads for years and may not know they are wrong, so won't think to look them up.
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Foreign-language words and names have this problem a lot. Only a few readers (like John Chu) seem to be able to handle Asian languages (but he has some really weird intonation...it works for some characters though). Someone pointed out in the thread for one of the Deathtraps stories that "Xnab" would be pronounced more like "Ish-nob" than "Znob" the narrator went with. edit: And it was mentioned in one of the later podcasts, which would be where I came across it.
I'd be willing to volunteer to give pointers for Japanese, Mandarin Chinese and Korean, if anyone needs it. Maybe there could be a volunteer language-coach registry for Escape Artists (or even fiction podcasts in general)?
For your example specifically: the general rule for English words is that if it has more than one syllable and if a syllable has one vowel in it, and is followed by two consonants, it will be a short vowel. If it is followed by one consonant it will usually be a long vowel. There are some exceptions, but when in doubt, that'll probably be correct.
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I'd be willing to volunteer to give pointers for Japanese, Mandarin Chinese and Korean, if anyone needs it. Maybe there could be a volunteer language-coach registry for Escape Artists (or even fiction podcasts in general)?
For your example specifically: the general rule for English words is that if it has more than one syllable and if a syllable has one vowel in it, and is followed by two consonants, it will be a short vowel. If it is followed by one consonant it will usually be a long vowel. There are some exceptions, but when in doubt, that'll probably be correct.
I can give advice for German, Polish, Bulgarian (and possibly other Balkan languages), Turkish, and Arabic (a bit). The consonant rule, e.g., would also hold true for German, but in the other languages I stated, double consonants are pronounced individually.
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Of course many people who do a lot of reading have words they've pronounced in their heads for years and may not know they are wrong, so won't think to look them up.
Until a few years ago I thought that "epitome" was pronounced "Eh-Pih-Tohm". This despite having heard it spoken aloud before as "Eh-Pit-Oh-Mee". I seriously thought they were two completely different words.
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Until a few years ago I thought that "epitome" was pronounced "Eh-Pih-Tohm". This despite having heard it spoken aloud before as "Eh-Pit-Oh-Mee". I seriously thought they were two completely different words.
I remember when I learned the proper pronunciation of that word, too. And it wasn't all that long ago.
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Epitome I learned to say correctly thanks entirely to Calvin and Hobbes. :-)
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Until a few years ago I thought that "epitome" was pronounced "Eh-Pih-Tohm". This despite having heard it spoken aloud before as "Eh-Pit-Oh-Mee". I seriously thought they were two completely different words.
Me too! I thought they were two entirely different words that just happened to have the same meaning. I don't remember when I finally figured it out, but I was at least in my mid-twenties, if not older.
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I must admit that this is one of my pet peeves. The narrator is creating an illusion for me as I listen, and it is broken (temporarily) when I have to figure out what word the narrator was really trying to say. I would suggest that narrators, if they are unsure, make a point of asking. But I realize this can get lost in the fast turnaround times sometimes required.
(My only other pet peeve is occasionally bad audio quality from a narrator. Since I usually listen in a car there is already background noise. But I don't mean to invade this thread with other bits)
Thanks for the stories!
-- Ethan