Profanity in your writing

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Your story, your choice.
Personally it doesn't bother me in books or films, as long as it suits the situation, and character.

Best use of, "bad language" I feel, is in Andy Weir's, The Martian. It's the only way the main character can, "let rip," so to speak about their situation, fear, hope and anguish. It also adds a dark humour to the book.
 
I've been reading The Idiot. I don't think there is any swearing, not even the drunken ruffians.... closest was when a character speaking in polite company says... "I let out a flood of abuse straight away, "you so and so," you know the sort of thing, Russian style."
 
The Big Peat said:
Swearing is fairly common in mainstream literature these days best as I can tell, particularly in the UK.
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The words s**t and f**k are even used fairly often in opinion/cultural columns (not the main editorial) in The Times. F**k is asterisked, but s**t isn't. The way it's used (often lightly) feels perfectly natural to me. The columnists are people who've watched TV shows like The Wire and assume their readers are the same, and that for them the words no longer have the force they used to.

A novelisation of The Wire, for example, would be absolutely ludicrous without copious swearing, because a realist novel would be silly without naturalistic dialogue. But I've read examples of fiction featuring similar types of characters, but outside a modern English-language context, where an absence of swearing doesn't detract at all. Sometimes its inclusion seems forced, and then it's much worse than complete absence.
 
I read that the actual historic Al Swearengen was considered foul mouthed at the time, but his profanities were biblical unlike the sexual and gynaecological profanities of the Deadwood character. He, in reality, would seem quite mild today, and not in keeping with the rest of the script.
 
JunkMonkey said:
Stewart Lee talking about writing stand-up
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Great clip, that man has to be the master of the build up -had him playing on a random YouTube clip during a long drive one day; someone had looped the build up to a gag and I'd gone through four iterations before I copped it. Think the mockumentary Fear of a Black Hat did swearaing well. They had a sort of fourth wall thing where one of the protagonists was making a film loaded with curses, and after a piece of rubbish dialogue turns to the camera saying 'who writes this sh*t'. Anyways, sorry for derailing the OP -don't think cursing would be a show stopper either way for readers.
 
Danny McG said:
I've looked at that several times since your comment, is he not handcuffed by his right wrist to burly plain clothes cop in a blue jacket? The man who jumps into the van with him
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Yes, you are probably right. Its a case of subtle handcuffing. Personally, I would never handcuff a young man to myself. That's what bedposts are for.
 
I think it depends on the milieu you are writing about. It would damage credibility if the characters in the desperate, seedy world of Trainspotting didn't swear - and they do, copiously. I reckon the thugs in Bladerunner swore a lot too. I found it odd that we didn't hear much bad language - though perhaps that had to do with certification. However, I think swearing works less well in more civilised, thoughtful or relaxed settings, and again, it's about credibility. But the odd word by the right character, at the right moment, can have a huge impact.
 
If one tried to write as people actually speak, it would be very hard to read imo.
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Didn't modernist writers and poets try that though, and James Joyce, T S Eliot and Gertrude Stein are still read?
 
Swank said:
What thugs in Bladerunner?
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Deckard, and all the replicants. Probably some/all of the owners/landlords of the various establishments we visit. T see the world of Bladerunner as a very violent, ruthless society.
 
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Orcadian said:
Deckard, and all the replicants. Probably some/all of the owners/landlords of the various establishments we visit. T see the world of Bladerunner as a very violent, ruthless society.
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I see Bladerunner as a planet full of old, sick or genetically damaged people who are all that's left after the healthy people went off world. The only gang shown are the little people trying to steal stuff off Deckard's car.

One of the hints that Deckard is also a replicant is that he looks just as healthy as the other replicants. (And he doesn't wear a hat.)
 
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