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'My dear Professor, surely a sensible person like yourself can call him by his name? All this "You-Know-Who" nonesense - for eleven years I have been trying to persuade people to call him by his proper name: Voldemort.'
-Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling |
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The Importance of Being Named
"You have always told me it was Ernest. I have introduced you to every one as Ernest. You answer to the name of Ernest. You look as if your name was Ernest. You are the most earnest-looking person I ever saw in my life. It is perfectly absurd your saying that your name isn’t Ernest."
-Algernon in The Importance of Being Ernest by Oscar Wilde
Shakespeare's Juliet is famous for moping over Romeo with the phrase: "What's in a name? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet."
Contrary to what Lady Juliet suggests, names are important. Who would want to write a poem about a sweet-smelling flower called a grog? I don't know about you, but that really doesn't sound appealing.
Naming our characters is an important task that sometimes isn't taken seriously enough. There's been many times I've read a fantasy story here on writing.com that caught my interest, but the character's name just made me cringe. This happens especially in fantasy because in many of our stories, we have to make up names that don’t sound like we borrowed them off of the “most popular names in America” list.
So what, you say. It’s just a name; there are more important things to worry about. Perhaps, but names are very important to your characters and characters are the central focus of any story usually so it is generally a good idea to pick their names carefully. Names can be used to reveal personality, or something subtle about the character that hasn't yet been revealed in the text. One of C.S. Lewis' books in the Chronicles of Narnia, the Voyage of the Dawn Treader, starts out with this wonderful sentence: There once was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it. Can you see how much is laden into that one sentence?
J.K. Rowling has taken a page out of Lewis' book and has become a queen of this art in her Harry Potter series. Here are a few examples of what I mean:
 Sirius Black = 'Sirius' is the name of a star, the "dog star" more specifically. What is his animagus form? A "Black" dog. This also hints at his personality, loyal and true. A "man's best friend", which he was to Harry's father James.
Remus Lupin = "Remus" is the name of one of the founding twins of Rome (Romulus and Remus) who were nursed by a she-wolf. "Lupin" has the root word "lupus" which is Latin for wolf.
Malfoy = "bad faith" in French. No comment necessary on this I think.
Here are a few tips for avoiding nomenclature no-nos.
 First, write down a list of all the names you admire from other well-known fantasy stories or TV shows: Galadriel, Rand al’Thor, Smaug, Aragorn, Buffy, etc.
Now, keep these in sight and never use them again! Every time you get tempted to try a spelling variation of Legolas or Frodo, slap your wrist. That is a bad way to show the reader that, yes, you have read that book wink, wink, nudge, nudge, and isn't it clever that I used a name that looks like but is not quite the same? (Yes I'm talking to you Mr. Paolini *cough*Eragon=Aragorn*cough*).
Make your names pronounceable. Maybe it's just me, but unless I can actually say a name, I can't imagine someone being called that. Your character's name is going to be mentioned a lot so make sure that this name isn't something that other characters (and yourself) are going to tangle their tongues trying to say. Perhaps you invented a nifty little language in which 'Xtylzker' actually sounds like 'Flower' when pronounced; please have a little note on pronunciation at the beginning of your story, or in a glossary somewhere.
Be gentle with hyphenations and apostrophe uses. Too many and it just looks ridiculous. Say your character has a long name... Ti'an'thel-ghul. Use it sparingly and have your character go by a nickname the rest of the time. Most of us have them and I don't know a Jennifer who'd not rather be called Jen, Jenny, or even Ferf in one case.
Another thing to be aware of in naming is the power of your names. Many ancient cultures feared that if someone knew your true name, they could have power over you--perhaps the beginning of the tradition of having a middle name in Western culture. Some cultures feared to name other things by their true name, thinking that they would call down unwanted attention on themselves.
For example, in Lord of the Rings, Tolkien's characters rarely say Sauron's name, fearing the notice it would draw to them. Most of the time the unseen villain of the story goes by other titles such as "The Lidless Eye", "The Dark Power", "The Black Hand," "The Lord of Mordor", and many others. J.K. Rowling's villain follows this vein as well. Everyone in the wizarding world, except Dumbledore, is afraid to say Voldemort's name; the rest refer to him as "You-Know-Who", "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" and "Lord Thingy". Voldemort himself might have feared the power of his father's Muggle name that his mother gave to him, perhaps fearing the power of death associated with a frail, mortal name, and re-named himself, ironically, with a name that means "flight from death" in French.
What does your own name mean? My name, Erin, is an Anglicanized version of Éireann which means Ireland and when I was reading up on Irish history in a history class, it seemed as though I could feel the thousands of years of Celtic history all compressed into my name. Can you see now the power of names? Use this to your advantage. |
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From: spiral kinetochore  
Wow! This is the first Fantasy NL I have read... I really learned a lot from Bob... so thanks!
But why is the story Skinchanger linked twice?
Oops! That was my mistake, the last story linked to should have been
From: billwilcox
Erin,
Great interview! I've put Bob in my favs folder, thanks for the introduction.
You're welcome, Bill  .
From: Puditat
Erin, what a fascinating interview with Bob DeFrank  . I loved every moment of it. Thanks for introducing us to Bob.
You're welcome Puditat  . I'm sure he'll like to hear that  .
From: nomlet
Another great newsletter, Erin. I enjoy the Biography channel, if you can't tell. I think you can learn from reading/studying another author's writing, but you can gain even more insight from an author's discussion of the writing process. How a character or plot came about, what revisions were made and why, that sort of thing. A behind the scenes look. -- nomlet
I agree nomlet. It is fascinating to see how others work; how they are similar and different from you and then learning from them to make your own writing better. |
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Fantasy: October 19, 2005 Issue [#663]
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