Then Speech is not an Impediment, A Sort of Brake on the Wheel of Intellect but like a Second Wheel Running Parallel with it on the Same Axle Maria Fusco (bio) This is an extract from my unpublished novella, Sailor. Set during the Blitz in Belfast, Northern Ireland in 1941, it is narrated by the eponymous Sailor—a two-year-old vervet monkey, smuggled from Freetown by a merchant seaman as a Christmas present for his wife, Sailor's adopted human parents "Mammy" and "Daddy"—written in first person Belfast dialect as an internal monologue. I am principal investigator of an Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded academic project entitled "De-localising Dialect," which seeks to untether (and to test) dialect from geographical location; one of my key concerns with this ongoing project is to see if it's possible, ethical, or even desirable to "score" dialect. As I was writing the text, I had a persistent idea that the monkey would already have a thick Belfast dialect in the Sierra Leonean jungle before he is trapped [End Page 526] and taken to Northern Ireland: I want to question, therefore, what is a natural way to speak and, by implication for the reader, what is a natural way to read. By writing the text not only in dialect but in phonetic dialect, my method is one of deceleration. Firstly for myself as writer: I must teach myself how to write phonetically, off-the-peg solutions for this way of writing are not fit for purpose, I must use my own voice, my own dialect as an laborious editorial tool (many of us do not like the sound of our voice). Secondly for the reader: they must try to be patient, to agree not to immediately comprehend certain syntactic phrasing and specific dialect words, to read slowly. The title of this extract is borrowed from "On the Gradual Construction of Thoughts During Speech," by Heinrich von Kleist and translated by Michael Hamburger. Me an Daddy takes ourselves oudda the house at the scrake of dawn, turned off our wee street ontil the Springfield Road. A tram made a stap til let more workers get on, the ones already inside all pointed an called out til me, their eyes near fell oudda their head so they did. Daddy lifted me right up off his sholder in both his hawns til give them a praper luck, but he houl me too tight roun the middle, an a noddie squeezed oudda me ontil the krib. That made the ones in the tram shout out even more loud, whoopin an cheerin like goodo. Daddy was nat one wee bit bathered, he put me back ondee his sholder, meself nouw wi one paw restin cross the tap of his head, holdin ontee his right ear, a loose grip but ready til grab on tight if ah needed til. Daddy walked heavy douwn the road, ah felt the hammer of his boots on the pavement, each step jiggin up intee ma baddie. It was a clear mornin, so it was, wi no mizzle, an ah was ownee a wee bit hungry. There was plenty of folk out already, scrubbin their frontdewersteps or cleanin their windees, too busy wi their work til notice me up on ma Daddys sholder. Shaps was openin their dewers for business. Rollin up their stripey red an white blinds was Burles, where Mammy goes til get her meat an eggs wi the ration book. Ah jumped oer the counter in there one time til get at sumthin that smelled nice, the mawn bahine it grabbed me, held me douwn wi one hawn on his big woodblock coverd wi sticky bits, an held up a cleaver in his oer hawn like he was gonna chap ma head off. Mammy was screamin. Evrybaddie else was near laughin their own heads off. Daddy went intee the caffy on the oer side of the road from the Burles. Mornin Missus. Gimme two of them sausage rolls, a mug of tea, hardly no milk, plenty of shugar in it. What in the name of God is that there? The oul lady servin pointed at me wi the teaspoon...