Voices

[Per Starback]

Mark asked about how we think Scrooge sounds:
> When I first read Uncle Scrooge comics in my youth, I heard Scrooge in
> my head with an American accent.

When I first read Uncle Scrooge comics in my youth he spoke Swedish so
I don't have much input here.  I've never really thought about voices
for the characters though, and I can't remember any internal evidence
on anything about the characters' voices in the comics (like someone
hearing that Scrooge is from Scotland or someone having a hard time to
hear what Donald is saying).

Torsten:
> The easiest way to denote an accent in writing is to change da spellin' uv
> da letturz so dat da readurz kin undahstands dat chur writin' in, uh,
> di-uh-lekt, and not Uhmurican.

Such comic book spellings are not common at all in Sweden (I guess
they are afraid the kids won't learn to spell properly if they read
too much of it), but I think they add colour to the dialogues.
Interestingly enough some of those spellings really don't indicate any
substandard or non-standard pronuncation, like "sez" for "says", but
anyway the reader is supposed to understand that that speaker doesn't
speak very proper.

Note Scrooge speech in The Old Castle's Secret where Barks first
told us of Scrooge's Scottish heritage, by the way!  He calls the boys
lads repeatedly, and says "aye" instead of yes. 
--       "
Per Starback, Uppsala, Sweden.  email: starback at student.docs.uu.se
"Take it easy, Scottie, ol' man!  'Tis me, Scrooge!  The last McDuck!"