Naming characters

[starrkers]

How do you do it?
Do the names just come to you, do you agonise for ages over the right name, or don't you really care?


Some characters have never needed names (yeah, that's right, they're in the stroke stories) and others, like Arabella and Helen, were obvious from the start.
But I've got a couple of characters that refuse to tell me their names. It's agonising, and holding me back from tellling their stories.
Am I nuts?

 

[CeriseNoire]

Sometimes I just give them generic names and go back to change them later, otherwise I'd be stuck forever. If the characters are heavily inspired by people I know, I try to pick a name that have similar qualities either in sound, origin, or the emotion they elicit.

 

[OhMissScarlett]

How do you do it?
Do the names just come to you, do you agonise for ages over the right name, or don't you really care?


Some characters have never needed names (yeah, that's right, they're in the stroke stories) and others, like Arabella and Helen, were obvious from the start.
But I've got a couple of characters that refuse to tell me their names. It's agonising, and holding me back from tellling their stories.
Am I nuts?

I don't think you're crazy at all. I always just seem to know what the names of my main characters are going to be. There have been times that I've resorted to phone books, baby name books and even the inside of CD cases to find a name when it didn't just come to me. It helps to break down my characters and think about whether they would have simple names or unique names. And then just start looking through lists of names that fit the category.

 

[mjl2010]

I pick names that fit the characters personality. Not that anyone else would agree. I find John to be a strong name. So for strong male characters I use John a lot. Later you can go back and do a find/change all if you change your mind. Just using the name that fits the character for me helps me write.

MJL

 

[CeriseNoire]

Oh and it has to be a name that doesn't bring anything unsexy to my mind. For example I can't use first names that any current students of mine have. Then it brings the kid to mind and totally turns me off.

 

[TheeGoatPig]

Varies from story to story. There have been times where I wrote the story around the name, and others where I changed the names three or four times before settling down on one for each character.

 

[Fallenfromgrace]

Hehe, ok for me i seem to know what i want to call my characters- the names relate to the person's personality, how i want them to come across. Most importantly they are reltaive to where my character comes from.

Naina- Indian
Isabella- Italian
Siobhan- Irish
Sophia- Greek

and the like

I find i use my favourite names on characters i really get involved with- like Naina is a very important character to me- very much based on my ideal image of me and so i gave her my favourite indian name.

Many of the names i use are names i would call my children- Jason, Aidan, Adam, Naina etc...

However i might find it awkward to name my child Jenna with an image of her fucking Isabella with a strap on etched into my mind! (does that make sense?!)

For any 'baddies' i may have i give them names i dont like or names of people in my life/past that i dont like. Like...i hate my assistant manager and if i had a baddie i may call her 'Suzi' and take all my anger out on her

-- heheeee... (i am WELL aware that i am weird...)

 

[IrezumiKiss]

Sometimes I just give them generic names and go back to change them later, otherwise I'd be stuck forever. If the characters are heavily inspired by people I know, I try to pick a name that have similar qualities either in sound, origin, or the emotion they elicit.

I do this often, myself.

I also write down names or words I can use as names that sound good to me from indirect sources whenever I read them, on stickies or scratch pads of paper.

I use a lot of ethnic characters in my works and I avoid using stereotypical, common also-ran, lazy signifier names for them. Like "Tyrone" or "Yumi" or "Juan." Yeah, they're real honest names, but when I see them obviously being used for ethnicities' sake, I'm like, oh my fucking God, here we go again...and it ruins whatever power of originality and creativity the story might have had. Even generally speaking regardless of color, the more uncommon the name, the better for the character, IMO. Or if I have to use an ethnic-sounding name I'll use one I've researched that actually means something instead of relying on some made-up name that merely sounds good enough.

 

[mckai777]

All of my characters are nameless. There is only She and He.

 

[Liar]

Sometimes I just give them generic names and go back to change them later, otherwise I'd be stuck forever.

me too. Except I don't go back and change them. Generic names are names too.

 

[Stella_Omega]

I prefer run-of-the-mill names, and try to make the name extraordinary by virtue of its being attached to an extraordinary person.

I mean, think about your biggest rock or film Idol. The very name sets your little heart a' beating, even though it's only "Johnny"* right?

Now, I am having a problem because- I am plotting out a SF/F novel, and I'm going to have to make up a lot of unearthly names. And i STILL want them to be "run-of-the-mill" in context.

But, I got a lot of spam at one poit that came from randomly generated names and some of them were terrific, poetic and mellifluous. I have a little list of those. I'd only use them in a "Tall Tale" or magical realism type setting though.





*Ramone, who did you think i was talking about!)

 

[Foxee Browne]

How do you do it?
Do the names just come to you, do you agonise for ages over the right name, or don't you really care?


Some characters have never needed names (yeah, that's right, they're in the stroke stories) and others, like Arabella and Helen, were obvious from the start.
But I've got a couple of characters that refuse to tell me their names. It's agonising, and holding me back from tellling their stories.
Am I nuts?

I had the same trouble, so I purchased a "what to name your baby" book .... lots of names to choose from usually a name just appears from its pages that fits the character I am writing about.

 

[only_more_so]

I have a lot of anxiety about naming characters, both first and last names. My first story was actually very easy, because the character names partially inspired the tone of the story (A Penny for a Buck). My other stories, I just try to find names that match the personality or sometimes the occupation.

Sometimes I am halfway through a story and realize I haven't named the character yet (since my stories come out first person). It is surprising to realize how seldom a person's name is actually used in dialog which would be the only time a story told in first person would need to use the character's name. So many times, the name only gets used a couple times in the story, so it can be a throwaway name.

In my Reluctant Psychic story, the main character is nameless. At first it was because I couldn't think of a name, but then because I realized it made a lot of literary sense.

 

[drksideofthemoon]

I've never had a problem naming my main characters. Sometimes I have trouble coming up with a name for a minor character.

I'll look on line....phone books...baby name books....

 

[rydia57]

I have a list of "character names" on my computer. It's for when I play RPG games and write stories. It's a list of names that I like the sound of..

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

I can't really tell you. But agonize? Never! It's like this - Sometimes the name occurs to me before the character does. Sometimes the name is a real name that I think is funny and file away (Harry Dick is a really person, but not a detective). And sometimes I chose a name because I like the way it sounds in an introductory sentence. Hedge Johnson was one of those. It just depends.

 

[3113]

How do you do it? Do the names just come to you, do you agonise for ages over the right name, or don't you really care?...

But I've got a couple of characters that refuse to tell me their names. It's agonising, and holding me back from tellling their stories.
Am I nuts?

Not at all. I agonize over names routinely. Sometimes for hours or days. I absolutely have to have character names. I've never been able to use substitutes--no matter how much I want to write the story, I have to have the names first. Just one of those things for me. And it needs to be right. As you say, if I don't have the right name, the character won't tell me their story.

Sometimes I'm lucky and I know the name and the character from the get-go. Other times, I have to search--which is a chore but not a terrible one as I love name books.
Also, I usually I have some idea of the *letter* that should start the character's name. Maybe not the precise lett"er--but I'll know that they're either "A" or "D" or "T" but not "J" or "S".

Of course, this name situation gets more problematic if there's several characters. A writer has to be careful not to have named that look too similar on the page. A Joan and a Juan are going to make it hard for readers to read the story. So as much as I may want both Joan and Juan, I'll know that I really can't have them and need to find an alternative.

 

[rydia57]

Harry Dick does sound like a great name for a detective... who'd a thunk it?

 

[scriptordelecto]

Hedge Johnson is just a fantastic name Jenny!

 

[TE999]

Baby name websites.

Phone books.

Community directories.

The newspapers. Even the obit's.

And magazines. Not celeb rags, though.

Sometimes a name will come to you from out of nowhere and it just feels right for the character.

The muse must be working her magic again.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Harry Dick does sound like a great name for a detective... who'd a thunk it?

The real Harry Dick was a General Contractor. I went to high school with his two sons, Jack and Jerry. How he got that name I have no idea.

 

[TE999]

The real Harry Dick was a General Contractor. I went to high school with his two sons, Jack and Jerry. How he got that name I have no idea.

He named a son Jack Dick?

That's funnier than Harry.

 

[scriptordelecto]

He named a son Jack Dick?

That's funnier than Harry.

*snerk*

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Hedge Johnson is just a fantastic name Jenny!

Hedge Johnson ran an auto repair shop in Nyssa, Oregon some years ago. I've had the name in my head for a long time, but never wrote a story where the name fit until Dead Man's Hill.

 

[deathlynx]

A lot of my stories (particularly the older, more stroke, pieces) are just "he and she"...others I do have names, but they usually don't bother me too much...I try to make sure I'm not using too many of the same first initials though since it can get confusing to have 4 "j" characters in the same story...especially when they're the same gender...

I usually have the hardest time with non-human names...