Ray McCarthy
Sentient Marmite: The Truth may make you fret.
Able to make Babies = Not Children any more.
Describing someone as a teen in historical fantasy?
- Thread starter Brian G Turner
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ralphkern
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2013
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- 1,156
How about describing them in some kind of world-building context, something like:
Not yet old enough to have seen/celebrated their naming/attainment/*fill in celebration here* day. (Perhaps a short scene earlier showing a naming day to give the reader context as to how old that is, for arguments sake 18).
You also seem to describe some pretty awful weather conditions in your crits:
Their skin was unmarked by the roughness of those that had lived for many winters in the bleak land of Brianally
Or more direct:
They looked like they had not seen eighteen summers.
The oldest in the group didn't look old enough to have felt the touch of a woman (Although obviously, in a medieval context, that might be pretty young!)
Or perhaps you can have some slang term within the world, probably not 'Whelp' or 'Kid' but something along those lines which gives an impression of youth, perhaps taken from the animal kingdom, without directly saying the age.
Not yet old enough to have seen/celebrated their naming/attainment/*fill in celebration here* day. (Perhaps a short scene earlier showing a naming day to give the reader context as to how old that is, for arguments sake 18).
You also seem to describe some pretty awful weather conditions in your crits:
Their skin was unmarked by the roughness of those that had lived for many winters in the bleak land of Brianally
Or more direct:
They looked like they had not seen eighteen summers.
The oldest in the group didn't look old enough to have felt the touch of a woman (Although obviously, in a medieval context, that might be pretty young!)
Or perhaps you can have some slang term within the world, probably not 'Whelp' or 'Kid' but something along those lines which gives an impression of youth, perhaps taken from the animal kingdom, without directly saying the age.
I would go with the adolescents already mentioned.
ZombieWife
all hail zombiecat!
A "youth" to me conjures up images of children. I've used, "nearly a man/woman," or something along those lines. Or, have just been specific about age. "He looked 16."
The ability to grow a beard has been a sign of approaching manhood, I think, all through the ages (as phrases such as "beardless youth" or "the kid didn't look old enough to shave" demonstrate).
So you might say something like "the oldest had sprouted a few straggling whiskers (or "had the swagger a boy takes on when he grows his first beard" or "the lower half of his face was darkened by what might either have been dirt or a first attempt at growing a beard" or whatever, depending on how charitable the viewpoint character is inclined to be in his/her observations) while some of the others appeared two or three years younger."
So you might say something like "the oldest had sprouted a few straggling whiskers (or "had the swagger a boy takes on when he grows his first beard" or "the lower half of his face was darkened by what might either have been dirt or a first attempt at growing a beard" or whatever, depending on how charitable the viewpoint character is inclined to be in his/her observations) while some of the others appeared two or three years younger."
Overread
Searching for a flower
Teenage - youth - young adult [yes the book market bracket] - apprentice. These are all rubbish terms.
They work as a general idea, but each one spans an age bracket where there is a vast variation. 13 to 19 is a huge range of changes in a characters maturity and if you go into things like apprentice the idea to a modern audience, could well be all the way up to people well into their twenties. Alone its a nice grouping term, but its also very imprecise and each reader will read something different.
Teresa sums up an ideal approach; use the advantage of the huge variety in the maturity in mental and physical ways of the characters in this age bracket. Describe them as characters and use several points of reference. This will give people a better ability to grasp the rough age range they are falling into - and even if they fail to get the age right they've at least picked up on the key physical and mental traits of the characters which will let them visualise them.
The use of key life dates in the world setting mentioned earlier is also an ideal way to give a nearly specific age without breaking the flow of the narrative into info-dumping. I suspect its also a reason a LOT of characters often start life in a story near to one of those major events. Heck it could be as simple as their birthday (pause and just realise that the whole start of the Lord of the Rings used this mechanic for Bilbo); or a naming celebration; or the day they earn their right to take a bride; or join battle; or become a man/woman etc..... Loads of potential there.
I think you can be more rough when the characters are background elements to a scene; a group of young teenagers were hanging around outside the church. The specific age isn't needed (though I'd always use things like young/old with teenages to at least give a rough split around the 14-15 bracket into two separate groups); and even if the reader makes a mistake its fairly minor.
They work as a general idea, but each one spans an age bracket where there is a vast variation. 13 to 19 is a huge range of changes in a characters maturity and if you go into things like apprentice the idea to a modern audience, could well be all the way up to people well into their twenties. Alone its a nice grouping term, but its also very imprecise and each reader will read something different.
Teresa sums up an ideal approach; use the advantage of the huge variety in the maturity in mental and physical ways of the characters in this age bracket. Describe them as characters and use several points of reference. This will give people a better ability to grasp the rough age range they are falling into - and even if they fail to get the age right they've at least picked up on the key physical and mental traits of the characters which will let them visualise them.
The use of key life dates in the world setting mentioned earlier is also an ideal way to give a nearly specific age without breaking the flow of the narrative into info-dumping. I suspect its also a reason a LOT of characters often start life in a story near to one of those major events. Heck it could be as simple as their birthday (pause and just realise that the whole start of the Lord of the Rings used this mechanic for Bilbo); or a naming celebration; or the day they earn their right to take a bride; or join battle; or become a man/woman etc..... Loads of potential there.
I think you can be more rough when the characters are background elements to a scene; a group of young teenagers were hanging around outside the church. The specific age isn't needed (though I'd always use things like young/old with teenages to at least give a rough split around the 14-15 bracket into two separate groups); and even if the reader makes a mistake its fairly minor.
Cascade
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Dec 25, 2014
- Messages
- 252
Although very similar to other suggestions, I would suggest you can provide an age range by reference to one of them. If the key elemant is that they are all younger than a certain age then 'a gaggle of youths the eldest just sporting his first whiskers' if it matters that they be above a certain age 'a gang of children, though even the smallest appeared to have seen at least 13 summers' clunky I know but you don't have to describe them all to describe them all.
Denise Tanaka
Denise RobargeTanaka
I like Ralph Kern's suggestion of establishing a coming-of-age ceremony. A lot of real world societies have some sort of adolescent rite of passage. Also the suggestion of using their physical attributes is good, the boys not yet full grown, lanky or with puppy feet, peach fuzz instead of full mustaches, etc. The problem that I often create for myself comes from the historical record where girls were married as soon as they hit puberty. In tracing my family tree, I have one ancestor who got married around 15 years old and she had at least 10 or 11 children. Whew! I'm assuming your group of "teenagers" are male and not yet bride shopping?
Danny McG
"Anything can happen in the next half hour!"
a stripling of some fourteen summers who shaves but once weekly.
a callow youth
a comely wench on the cusp of womanhood.
a fair young damsel.
a callow youth
a comely wench on the cusp of womanhood.
a fair young damsel.
ErikB
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- Joined
- Sep 11, 2016
- Messages
- 371
Youth/youths, adolescents, unhardened, young, barely ___ seasons/years of age, unseasoned, etc.
Use generalisms to describe these teens.
Also remember that life spans were shorter due to malnutrition, dangers from illness and disease, and as a result living into your forties and fifties was rarer as well. Sixties rarer still.
Plenty of teens (esp. Late teens) were married and considered young men and women. So referencing them as "untested", " unseasoned", "barely grown", etc was more common than one might expect.
In some cultures physical markers of accomplishment were used in males to denote status (often accompanied by age). For example the Cherusci, a Germanic barbarian tribe, dyed their hair red and it was grown long and not allowed to be cut until an opponent had been killed in battle.
Only then could the head be shaved or the hair cut back or drawn into a bound topknot or pony tail. So teens were also reffered to as " unkept" or "long locks" etc.
But I would use a simple term or terms to alude to age rather than calling them teens.
Use generalisms to describe these teens.
Also remember that life spans were shorter due to malnutrition, dangers from illness and disease, and as a result living into your forties and fifties was rarer as well. Sixties rarer still.
Plenty of teens (esp. Late teens) were married and considered young men and women. So referencing them as "untested", " unseasoned", "barely grown", etc was more common than one might expect.
In some cultures physical markers of accomplishment were used in males to denote status (often accompanied by age). For example the Cherusci, a Germanic barbarian tribe, dyed their hair red and it was grown long and not allowed to be cut until an opponent had been killed in battle.
Only then could the head be shaved or the hair cut back or drawn into a bound topknot or pony tail. So teens were also reffered to as " unkept" or "long locks" etc.
But I would use a simple term or terms to alude to age rather than calling them teens.
This.
I think "adolescent" would be almost, not quite, as jarring as teen-age.
How about "young peasants/villagers/squires/warriors" whatever they are - think that might get across that they are young adult members of whatever society/locality you are describing? Or "sullen/awkward/aimless/loitering young peasants" to get their youthfulness across even more?
I ended up figuring out a solution to this, but I'm sure further comments will be useful for other members here. 
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