Characters and Names

[sailorm72003]

I find myself curious about the method (if any) that others are using to name characters.

Do you use names of people you know, the baby name books?

Do you find a character entering a story, and think- "ahh, I need to name this person!"



For me, they almost seem to name themselves. I usually have a name that I use to begin, and sometimes I find that the character changes in my writing, and the names seem to come as I go along.

Anyone else?

Sailor

 

[Guest]

Hi Sailor. I've just created 3 new characters for the Snippettsville thread and as usual spent too much time on names. It's always a torture for me. Names are intimate for me, in real life too. At times with a new lover it can take me a while before I can actually call them by name. Odd, but that's me. Then of course once I'm familiar and comfortable with someone, saying their name is an actively intimate thing.

I like to choose names I know from literature generally, and if using foreign names I will use Google, but still I need to find a meaning in the name or at least it's connotation or evocation.

best, Perdita

 

[Quint]

I'm somewhere between you two. In erotica, my characters kind of spring forth with their name blatantly stuck to them. Nothing to do for it then but keep it. When I wrote a children's story this summer, I did not have a clue what to name the child. I wanted his name to mean something about seeking or questioning, and so I searched online and came up with Kaimi, a Hawaiian name meaning "seeker for answers." It fit him perfectly.

So it varies from situation to situation, but it's always a very personal procedure.

 

[Omni]

Very seldom does the right name just come for me. Usually I must research it. Not for meaning, but for the sound and feel of the name. My favorite is to flip through the phone book. I have an entire series of novellas and got every characters name from my phone book.
The characters name is very important to me. I think it adds flavor to the entire story. I once wrote a story, quite a long one, using one name. However, on the day I was set to publish it, I realized a nagging thought that would not leave me alone. The male characters name was not right. It just was not dark and Gothic enough. With that simple thought the right name came to me. Thank god for find and replace!
I also watch movie credits for names with flavor and for ethnic characters, I will do internet searchs.

Omni

 

[Rainbow Skin]

Names do have resonances, much as I try to avoid them. There's no reason she can't be blonde and Rebecca, even if I think of Rebeccas as dark. But if I force myself to say she's a blonde Rebecca, I then have a different character.

I find a flurry of possible names descends slowly on my characters early on, and I try to catch at them and turn them over and adjust my thinking before any one settles too firmly.

I might think spontaneously 'Let's call her Rebecca' -- then think 'nah, Rebeccas are taller than that and have a rounder nose' -- so Rachel? Becky? Betty? What else begins with R... Rhiannon, Raine, Rhonda... but as I go through 'near matches', each one is a slightly different character. However close Rebecca and Rachel might resonate in my mind, choosing one or the other slightly alters her future, because Rachel will think slightly differently.

It is much harder to replace a name once the story is set. I did it once -- it was about a real person (without their knowledge) and before I posted it here I had to think of a name that had similar resonances for me but wasn't identifiable to the real person.

 

[necrotron]

whatever comes to mind

Unfortunately, I use whatever name comes to mind for most of my stories. I do try to pick names the Spellcheck will accept, so I don't have to see it underlined in red!

Usually the name is obvious for me. It just comes as I describe or write the character. Else, I rough a name in and then change it later.

A good book for names though is "Beyond Jennifer & Jason". It's baby names but sorts them by style & meaning, instead jsut alphabetical.

Good luck and let your mind roam!

 

[sailorm72003]

Names do have resonances, much as I try to avoid them. There's no reason she can't be blonde and Rebecca, even if I think of Rebeccas as dark. But if I force myself to say she's a blonde Rebecca, I then have a different character.

I know just what you mean, and sometimes its just the way a name is used. Rebeccas are dark, I agree, but "Becky" has blonde hair.



Thanks for all of your replies, Im facinated.

Sailor

 

[pop_54]

Hmmmmmmmmmmm

I use names of folks I know quite a bit, usually applying them to a character who bears no resemblance at all to the real person.

I try to make sure that the cliche'd name thing is avoided if possible, you know, 'Bruce' the butch he-man, 'Tina' the blonde flirt, 'Randy Mandy' the trollop, and that sort of thing.

I'm not all that good at making up names on the spur of the moment, so I just use one's already in existance with a little care thrown in.

pops.............

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I NEVER use names of people that I know. The more people I know, the harder it gets to find un-used names for my characters.
By next year, I'll be down to giving all my characters Korean and Greenlandic names.

Kiwutteraguimarukakokilamersattowika took Xianji's cock in her mouth...

 

[Quint]

I NEVER use names of people that I know. The more people I know, the harder it gets to find un-used names for my characters.
By next year, I'll be down to giving all my characters Korean and Greenlandic names.

Kiwutteraguimarukakokilamersattowika took Xianji's cock in her mouth...

Damn...I'll never be able to look at Xianji again without thinking of that.

 

[Quint]

It's strange but I've been able to use even family members' names in my stories before. In fact, my most commonly-used alter-ego has my mother's name. It was one of those "just kind of came to me from nowhere" things, and it hasn't made me feel weird at all. My mom is my mom; my female character is a girl who is subjected to all kinds of NC fiction. If ever there COULD be weirdness, it'd be there, but it isn't. Go figger.

Agree on the dark Rebecca.

Does anyone else find it really disconcerting when you open a story and there is your character's name with a totally different character claiming it? After writing Beth a couple of chapters displaying her quirky imaginative sensitivity, it was a horrid shock to see her sleeping around on her hubby with an overendowed black man. "Beth isn't like that!" I wanted to scream at the offending author. That's like using your roommate's washcloth. I might be wrong. It's conceivable. I'm conceiving of it right now.

 

[Sabledrake]

Hey, guys, Rebecca is my kid's name! Though she goes by Becca and has brown hair. I don't know how that fits the pattern

I have a couple of name books. My favorite is from the Writer's Digest Book Club, which breaks up the names by culture (and includes Arthurian names, which I thought was interesting), and gives meanings for them.

Most of the time, an important character already has a name -- it's not so much a matter of thinking one up as discovering what that name already is. For lesser characters, I'll go browsing and see what I like.

Sabledrake

 

[destinie21]

when I pick a name for my stories erotic or non I try to work in names that I think will fit the character. SOmetimes the name comes first then I develop the character or other times it's just the opposite. i realize that names sometimes carry characteridtics of their own even in the way that they're spelled.
for instance Rebecca may be a totally different character than Rebekah. (Rebekah being the hebrew or biblical spelling)

 

[dr_mabeuse]

If the character doesn't come with his/her own name, lots of times I'll just call them X. or SS or AA or something else easy to write. I'm big on names that are easy to type. Then when the name comes to me I'll just do a search-and-replace.

You know, there was a country&western producer/manager who claimed to have three names he was willing to sell that would make whomever bought them famous, guaranteed. I think he was asking $10,000/a name.

One was Conway Twitty, the second was Ferlin Husky, and he died without selling the third.

---dr.M.

 

[sailorm72003]

If the character doesn't come with his/her own name, lots of times I'll just call them X. or SS or AA or something else easy to write. I'm big on names that are easy to type. Then when the name comes to me I'll just do a search-and-replace.

---dr.M.

That's similar to what I meant initially,where the name comes in, and changes sometimes.

Destinie, I think the spelling makes a huge difference. I have totally different mental pictures of a Laurie, Lori, Lorree...
and I work with one of each, and Lori keeps throwing me off, I think she was incorrectly named

S

 

[MathGirl]

One was Conway Twitty, the second was Ferlin Husky, and he died without selling the third.

Dear Dr M,
It was probably the ubiquitous Heywood Yablowme.
Nomenclaturely,
MG
Ps. Can anyone think of a name that can be spelled more different ways than "Darrell?" Cathy?

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Kristoffer
Christopher
Christoffer
Kristopher

 

[Jenny _S]

Hmmmm...

If the character doesn't come with his/her own name, lots of times I'll just call them X. or SS or AA or something else easy to write. I'm big on names that are easy to type. Then when the name comes to me I'll just do a search-and-replace.

That's more or less what I do. As you get into the writing, the correct name seems to happen. Although I sometimes have to think about how appropriate the name is. Would you call the gung ho Marine Sargent Bruce? I actually know one who is named Bruce but it just wouldn't work quite right in a story. Also, I limit the names in my stories to no more than 6 letters. That seems to save a lot of stupidity on my part.

 

[CWatson]

For me, names come with the character; they just spring fully-formed from my head after someone splits it with an ax. If not, I generally end up with a really strong sense of what kind of name I'd like, so it's not too hard to narrow the field down and pick something useful.

The thing I always concentrate on is the spelling. I play around with spelling constantly, trying to find the version that perfectly fits the character. As destinie21 pointed out, Rebecca is a VERY different person from Rebekah. There aren't always useful alternate spellings ("Robeckah"?) but it's a useful exercise. Names can be REALLY descriptive.

I also make up my own names. It's a hit-and-miss endeavour, but if you put an infinte number of monkeys at an infinite number of typewriters, you'll get SOMEthing eventually. I'm big into that whole elegant, flowing name thing, so it's sometimes hard to come up with good male names. What kind of guy walks around with the name Joraelis?

You know what'd be interesting? To make a list of what impressions people associate with different names. It'd be weird, because I know some names would trigger WILDLY different associations with some people, but... It's like the collective unconscious or something. And it'd be useful to know that, while Rebecca means a dark-haired, serious girl to some, everyone else seems to see her as a rambunctious frizzy red-head. (Probably not. But seriously, you never know.)

Svenskaflicka: variations on that name (with altered pronunciation) include Christophoros, Christobel, Krystofyr, Krystupasr and, if you REALLY wanna get crazy, Kristofr. Damn glad my parents didn't use THAT alternate spelling. Bad enough sharing a name with one of twenty-five males born in my birth year. Nowadays, if you've got random characters you need naming, you just use Chris and Jenny. Someone should write a parody story starring those two characters and make them the most boring people ever.

 

[Rainbow Skin]

Re: Hmmmm...

Would you call the gung ho Marine Sargent Bruce?

When the first Hulk film came out years ago, Mad did a parody in which one character happened to mention to another that they'd changed the Hulk's name from Bruce Banner in the cartoon to David Banner in the film, perhaps because it wasn't manly enough.

Simultaneously in this panel, a radio was broadcasting the results of an Olympic running race, as Bruce Jenner won it, climaxing with the announcer's shriek of, 'And Bruce is the world's greatest athlete!'

I wouldn't call a Marine Sergeant Butterfly or Petal, well not to his face anyway, but Bruce is a perfectly ordinary name, and anything that resists stereotyping of ordinary names is good.

 

[oggbashan]

If the character doesn't come with his/her own name, lots of times I'll just call them X. or SS or AA or something else easy to write. I'm big on names that are easy to type. Then when the name comes to me I'll just do a search-and-replace.
---dr.M.

I do something similar then use one of a dozen baby name books when the characters start to develop individuality.

My problem is that once I have used a name, that character colours any future use of that name. So I cannot have two Lisa's even if they are in totally different scenarios. As I keep writing, the normal names I can use reduce in number.

Sometimes I have wasted a perfectly good name on a story which is still-born. Even though the story will never be completed, if the character has developed to the stage where a name is used, I cannot re-use that name.

Og

 

[Jenny _S]

True

I do something similar then use one of a dozen baby name books when the characters start to develop individuality.

My problem is that once I have used a name, that character colours any future use of that name. So I cannot have two Lisa's even if they are in totally different scenarios. As I keep writing, the normal names I can use reduce in number.

Sometimes I have wasted a perfectly good name on a story which is still-born. Even though the story will never be completed, if the character has developed to the stage where a name is used, I cannot re-use that name.

Og

For that reason I've just made up non-ordinary names and used them in Sci-Fi/Humor as a series with the same characters repeating again and again.

"Buck" or "Debbie" in two different unrelated stories seems to give me a strange "series" mind-fuck that makes writing that much harder.