Last week I re-read Sergeant Joe by Mary Jane Staples and its wonderful Cockney dialogue got me thinking about dialect.

Mary Jane Staples was actually Reginald Thomas Staples. What comes through in his books is the celebration of Cockney life. His frequent use of dialect never grates on the nerves, and I think it’s because he captures the rhythm and idiom, loves and respects it, and doesn’t fall into the trap of simply scattering a few “cor blimeys”.

I wonder if to truly write a dialect you have to have lived with it in your ears.