Writing Blog Number 2

20240407 Naming Characters

Naming Characters

Names are interesting.

Some people think that names don't matter and they just choose names that they like, sound good or - in the case of one author I have worked with - are derivations of the names of the people the characters are based on. This has become interesting as his ex-partner is named Alyce (pronounced Al-eess) and now a string of characters named Alice, Alyson, Elyse, etc. who are nasty women have appeared in his short stories.

I take naming characters more seriously than just a pretty name or name I like.

I admit, that in some stories set in the modern world, I will name characters after a real person I know. I rarely base characters wholesale on real people any longer, but if the characters has some elements based from a real person more than other people, then their name (well, like my friend, a derivative thereof) may be what I use.

However, I am more likely to choose a name that means something that relates to the character's personality or the story in general. So, a website of baby names is where I go, so I can type in the meaning and find names that suit, then match these names to the cultural background of the character in question. An example of this is I gave a pack of werewolves all names - male and female - that meant wolf. I was surprised at how many I found, and had some left over.

Now, in my fantasy, the names I choose take this to the next level of nerd-dom. All names in the stories mean something that relates to the character, based on Latin, Greek, Anglo-Saxon or Norse words, changed to fit the tone of the story, and the area of my world that the characters come from. Having a strong Latin background, which led to a good ancient Greek knowledge, and recently going through Anglo-Saxon and Old English has given me an advantage in this. The other thing I might do is take the name of a little-known ancient deity and use that name if their sphere of influence matches the character i have in mind (or, again, I change it to suit the area of the world). Again, I have a list of around 10,000 ancient gods, and I have set up my own index, so this is something that I have prepared earlier.

And that, in a nutshell, is how I name my characters.