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I have a fantasy story in my head for several years now. I wrote an outline for a book and draw a crude map of the world. I even started writing the first draft, but one of my biggest problems is my vocabulary. I am Swiss and my native language is German. But I mostly read English high fantasy (Tolkien, Howard, Sanderson, Eriksson) and also watch movies in English. But still I am struggling to write something that doesn't feel it's written like a primary school essay of an English or American child. I don't like reading and writing in German (I blame my German teacher), the only exception was the Witcher books as the German translation from the original Polish ought to be way better than the English.

Is there a way to get more (fancy) words in to my vocabulary to make it a better read, beside the aforementioned reading and watching in English?

Or, probably too opinion based, does it even make sense to try to write a novel in a non native language?

Thomas
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    Hi Thomas, welcome to writing.se! Take the [tour] for the usual badge. You are currently asking two questions. I would suggest you focus one of them then ask another question if you need to. Good luck and thanks for participating! – linksassin Aug 15 '19 at 07:12
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    Regarding what language to write in, here's a question that asks exactly that: https://writing.stackexchange.com/q/46858/14704 – Galastel supports GoFundMonica Aug 15 '19 at 07:14
  • As for expanding your vocabulary, apparently we have at least four questions about that: https://writing.stackexchange.com/q/653/14704, https://writing.stackexchange.com/q/32159/14704, https://writing.stackexchange.com/q/20024/14704, https://writing.stackexchange.com/q/6707/14704 – Galastel supports GoFundMonica Aug 15 '19 at 07:17
  • @Galastel thanks for the links, I was of course first looking through some questions, but missed the first one. The others I found but the consensus is to reading. Though if am engaged in the story, these words don't register enough to be added to my vocabulary. – Thomas Aug 15 '19 at 07:26
  • @Thomas no worries. I was surprised to find so many questions about increasing vocabulary myself. :) Anyway, with those questions in hand, you can focus yours on what they don't answer, if there's anything you're not answered about. – Galastel supports GoFundMonica Aug 15 '19 at 07:30
  • @linksassin The second question on its own would most probably be closed based on too opinion based, so I tried to sneak it in. – Thomas Aug 15 '19 at 07:43
  • Fancy words is the least of the problem. Problems with grammar and verb tenses show up even in the short text of your question. Sentence structure in German is different from English - that also leaks through in your question. Wurde ich versuchen, eine Roman in Deutsch zu schreiben, müsste ich jemandem haben der meine Texte korrigiert - und zwar so wie ich es gemeint habe und nicht wie ich es geschrieben habe. It'd take someone who knows what I am trying to write and how I am trying to express it. Basically, a collaborative effort between two authors, – JRE Aug 15 '19 at 10:22
  • Und, das sage ich als Amerikaner der seit 30 Jahre in Deutschland wohnt und qausi nur Deutsch spricht im täglichen Leben. And, I say that as an American who has lived in Germany for the last 30 years and only speaks German in my daily life. – JRE Aug 15 '19 at 10:26
  • @JRE Outch, is it really that bad? But thanks for the honest comment. – Thomas Aug 15 '19 at 10:42
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    @Thomas: It isn't bad. It is noticeable. In daily conversation, you'd get by just fine. If the characters in your book speak oddly, and obviously aren't modern day English speakers, then that would be fine. If the narrative text in between were that way it would be irritating. – JRE Aug 15 '19 at 10:58
  • I'm sure that I made errors in even just those few sentences in German. I'm not putting you down. I am making something explicit that I live with every day - from the flip side, so to speak. You German to English, and I English to German. – JRE Aug 15 '19 at 11:30
  • @JRE Not to let this grow into a chat, but just a short reply: I fully understand what you are trying to tell and appreciate it. I have no problem with an honest opinion, I am well aware that my English is far from perfect, but so is my German. Thus the side question, which you partially answered with your comments -> I should have some native speaker to help me with it, if I'm going forward writing the story in English. – Thomas Aug 15 '19 at 11:41
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    Fact is, you will never reach native fluency in English without living in an English speaking environment. I strongly advise you to write in your native German. The first books will feel cumbersome, but the writing acutally doesn't come much easier for someone habitually reading in the language they write in, and after a bit of writing under your belt and continual daily practice, you'll become more and more "fluent" in your writing. –  Aug 15 '19 at 12:40
  • @B.L.E. Hm, I really dislike German grammar and I don't enjoy writing in German. I work in IT and most of the time in an international environment, everything is in English. Even if it sounds weird, my German vocabulary is probably more limited than my English, due to the fact, that I mostly ready and watch in English. I often struggle to find the German word for some thought I had in English. But you are probably right that I would need to spend a rather long time in an English speaking community to be able to write in a decent way. – Thomas Aug 15 '19 at 13:37
  • If you are set on writing in English, maybe you won't "reach native fluency", but with enough hard work, you can get close. The thing that is hardest to get right is not grammar or vocabulary, however, but that individual voice of people coming from a particular location or social class: the particular words they would use, the specific expressions, etc. Look at how Sam in The Lord of the Rings speaks for example. The grammar and vocabulary - those you can get to native-speaker level. – Galastel supports GoFundMonica Aug 15 '19 at 15:00
  • I am German. I have been reading almost exclusively in English since I was around 15 years old. I later studied English. But I live in Germany and everyone around me is speaking German. I find that when I want to write, many ideas and phrases, sometimes whole passages come to me in English. But when I give them to a native speaker to read, they mark up almost every second word as wrong or not used in the way a native speaker would use it. Contrary to what Galastel says, the main difficulty is lack of grammar and vocabulary. I get the tempus wrong, I use German sentence structure and so on. –  Aug 15 '19 at 16:22
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    For many years I have attempted to write in English, but eventually began writing in German, because even though I think in English, I don't think in correct English. It is not enough to have a passive fluency through decades of reading in English. You need an active fluency that comes only with an active everyday use of the language. And even then, many native speakers cannot write correct English! Writing well enough to publish is a whole other level from being fluent orally. And I'm not even that. –  Aug 15 '19 at 16:26
  • Once I started writing in German, I quickly noted how I simply know the language in a way that I do not know English despite my long passive familiarity with it. I know what the words mean, I feel how the feel of a sentence changes when I reorder words (which I don't feel in English). And after writing in German for a few years, I no longer "dislike" German and I'm fluent as if I had been reading only German all my life. So while I understand the appeal of writing in the language you read in, and the opportunity that publishing in English (to a much larger audience) poses, I adivse German. –  Aug 15 '19 at 16:28
  • @user40570 thanks for your first hand insight. I will consider this and try to write a few chapters in German to see how it feels. – Thomas Aug 16 '19 at 09:33

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