Writing Onomatopoeia in Kink-Fic
One thing a lot of people SEEM to enjoy in my stories is the use of onomatopoeia, particularly with how I write burps. I’m very flattered, for the record! So I thought I’d share a quickie on how I go about it and some suggestions for other kink-fic writers out there.
The first is not to just write out the word in bold or all caps. A lot of times, when people use onomatopoeia, I see it as things like this:
For gurgles, people just write out:
*GUUUUUUURRRRGLE!* Or *GRRROOOOOOOOWWWWWL!*
And for everyone’s favorite, burps, people tend to write out:
“BUUUUUUURRRRRP!” Or “BEEEEEEEEEELLLLLCH!” Or if they’re feeling daring, “BRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAP!!”
My advice is just write out how you think something actually sounds. Unless a person is actually burping out those words, usually, the first two isn’t the sound you’ll hear. ‘XD
For example, gurgles rise and fall. I play with that in a few ways to emphasize how deep a stomach gurgling sounds like.
The start signifies the gurgling starts low, and the all caps signifies it picked up and got louder by the end.
Another example would be like this.
Same as before, it starts low, but picks up, with a few lower cause vowels to emphasize the gurgling is rising and falling. And the boldening emphasizes that it’s a far deeper gurgle than the one above.
And in both cases, I don’t word it to make it sound like the word gurgle, I word it in a way that translates how I envision a stomach gurgling subtitle would sound like if transcribed directly.
For a REALLY loud or intense gurgle, I’d write something more straight forward.
*GWWWOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRGGGLLLUUULLP!!!!*
It’s all caps, boldened, and in a header font to demonstrate that’s LOUD. And I’m typing it in a way that you can follow the sound of gurgling. Not just typing out random letters.
This is where you can get a lot more creative because there’s tons of ways for a burp to sound, different lengths, volumes, etc. The first note I have is don’t punctuate EVERY single burp with onomatopoeia. You still have to actually describe the burp in your text, and sometimes, just writing out that description is enough. You usually wanna save onomatopoeia moments when you REALLY wanna punctuate the sound.
So, for starters, when I wanna emphasize that a burp is weak and strained, I’ll write something like this out.
A strained burp has a quick cutoff, like someone’s really trying to put it out, so I have that first part, and the second part, I have the first few letters in caps to emphasize that it starts louder then trails off lowly and weakly.
For regular burps, or even generally loud ones, I don’t write out the onomatopoeia. I just type out that the character belched in the description. Your imagination can usually handle the rest from there.
For a strained but deeper and gurgly burp, I’ll write something like this out.
“Buur...BrrruUUUUUUuUuuUup!”
Same as the previous example, it starts with a quick, weak burp that doesn’t finish, and ends with one that picks up a little louder, but has more lower cases in between the upper case letters to emphasize the gurgle of a burp rising and falling in pitch.
When it comes deep and louder burps, I play with ‘em in a few different ways.
I use the classic onomatopoeia examples like these:
“BRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAP!” or “AAAAAUUUUUUUURRRRRRP!!!” and “HUUUUUUUUURRRRRRP!!!”
But I also mix ‘em up to mess with pitch and make it feel more real.
“BRRRAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUURRRRP!!” or “UUUUUURRRRROOOOOOORRRRRP!!!” and “HUUUUUAAAAAAAAARRRRRRP!!!”
A few other basic examples are things like:
“BWWWWOOOOOOOOUUUUURRRRRP!!!”
“BRRRRREEEEEEEUUUUUUUUURRRRP!!!”
“UUUUUURRRRAAAAAAAAAP!!!!”
“BEEEEEEEEELLLLLUUUUUUUUUURRRRRRCH!!!!!”
The amount of explanation marks as the end isn’t to punctuate length, but volume. So if a burp is really long but not very loud, I’ll write it out like this:
“BWOOOUUURR-uuurrrr-OOOOOooooooouuuuuurrrrp!!!”
But if a burp is shorter but MUCH louder, I’ll write it out like this.
Finally, for the MASSIVE and lengthy belches, the ones that extend for record-breaking times. The trick is to write ‘em out so there’s a sorta rhythm to it, where you can follow the sound, but also not to make it TOO long because eventually, it’s hard to keep track and the burp sound just ends up looking like random letters since your mind can no longer keep up with the information.
I keep the rhythm simple, and tend to extend a burp with hyphens to signify brief breaks mid-burp.
“BRRAAAAAAAAOOOOORRR-UUUURRROORRR-uuurrr-HUUUUUUAAAAAAARRRRROOOOOOOOORRRRP!!!!!!!”
This way, you can keep up with each ‘chain,’ hear the intended sound, and not get lost in length. And when I have a character who is letting out one colossal belch after the other, I don’t write out every single one. The first, and usually the last are the ones I write out. The rest, I describe and leave it to the imagination.
And a general note for both gurgling and burping onomatopoeia, only use one letter for the first and last letters of any ‘sound.’ There’s no sound for multiple B’s and P’s in a burp sound. The only sound where that makes sense is when you’re blowing raspberries at someone. XP
Finally, for a character who burps out a word, you can write the word in all caps and bold, or you can really play with the sound.
For example, suppose Bakugou just belched out loud and Ilda is giving him crap about his manners, demanding Bakugou excuse himself.
Naturally, this would be Bakugou’s response:
“Eh-EX-ssSCUUUUUSSSE...ur-mMMMMEEEEEEEEEEEEE-EEEEEEEUUUUUUUUUURRRP!!!!”
Or if someone belches mid-sentence, it’s good to play with onomatopoeia and start the burp with the letter that best matches the part of the word getting cut off.
“Who the hell are youuuUUUUUUURRRROORRRP!!”
“Urgh, eating this m-much was a bad ideaaaAAAUUUURRRRP!!”
So yeah! These are some notes on onomatopoeia. I hope they prove useful to...somebody! ‘XD