Authors: How do you come up with character names?
The character pictured at the left is from An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England. It is Rory McGuinness, and I put him up to answer my own question above. I stole the name Rory McGuinness whole cloth from the novel by Elizabeth Linington, The Proud Man, pictured below, which I read when I was about 14. He is one of the only two entirely fictional characters. I created both Rory and Shannon as a result of reading it.
Of course many of you write about historical figures. I know where Susan Higginbotham got the name Hugh le Despenser.. all of them. I know where Brandy Purdy got the name Piers Gaveston. I know where Morgan Llywelyn got the names Finn MacCool and Brian Boru. And I know where Sharon Kay Penm an got the name Richard, Duke of Gloucester.
I generally prefer to write about purely fictional characters. In a much earlier post on this blog I explained where the names of my central characters in AIK came from. The only original -- meaning coming from the early years of "The Story" -- character whose name I change is the king's cousin Gaylord, whose new name came from a web site called "Proseography" that listed Anglo Saxon names drawn from legal documents and other contemporary sources. (Greta Marlow said the name Gaylord wasn't evil; enough.) Most of the rest of the characters also came from that site or other sites listing names in Brythonic, Breton, and so forth.
I have had to come up with a few names of entriely fictional characters from the Napoleonic era of late, and I have to say they just occur to me. I might go through several names before I hit on the one I think fits the character.
So, authors of the world, how do you come up with the names for your characters? Please answer in Comments below.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
What's In a Name?
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I came up with Crispin Guest for my character in Veil of Lies in two goes. One, the name "Crispin" was one I was ready to use in whatever new book I was writing. When coming up with a name I must like the way it looks (since I will be typing it a lot) and the way it sounds, since, presumably, I'll be talking about him a lot (I think I would have to skip "Gaylord" for that reason). It's also the name of a saint and could well be used in teh 14th century (other names are chosen by what are in common use in that era on documents of the time. Some that we might think of as "medieval" might have been popular earlier or later but not in the timeframe in which I write. "Medieval", afterall, encompasses about a thousand years.). Next was the last name. I'm a little quirky in that if the character has a first name with two syllables, I like a last name with one syllable or visa versa. There are exceptions, of course, but it's all about cadence. So I wanted a one syllable last name. I think I was at the movie theatre when I saw a poster of a movie starring Christopher Guest and I thought that "Guest" was a good name, thinking it was vaguely French (it's not. It's Welsh. But even better.) And then working with the idea that the name has meaning; his name is "Guest" but he's not welcomed anywhere. It stuck.
ReplyDeleteJeri Westerson
I use a lot of Hebrew names and sometimes names just suggest themselves or are names of people I know.
ReplyDeleteRuchama Epstein, got her first name after I met a then ten month old baby named Ruchama. The name means mercy in English.
Oola's name came from a naming site. I found it among Australian aboriginal names. I wanted something short, sweet, and original.
Blessed's last name is Bartlow, the name of a late exboyfriend. The first name just sounded great for a preacher's daughter. She is actually the daughter of two preachers.
Vala's name is also from a baby database. It means wanted and desired. Since she chose it herself, it makes sense. Vala's name in Chinese is Choi Jin-Shyou. Jin-Shyou was the name of my gibbon on Power Pets. I think it means golden jade. I also used a naming databse to obtain it.
As an author of historical fiction I am fortunate in that most of the characters are already named. I usually only need to come up with names for minor characters who only make cameo appearances such as ladies-in-waiting or valets, but I confess I find it tremendously hard. I can write ten pages and then get stalled for an hour just trying to think of a suitable name for a lady's maid. When this happens I will often go grab a nonfiction book about the appropriate time period off the shelf and browse the index and hope I come across something suitable.
ReplyDeleteI had a short-cut for the Adelsverein Trilogy character names: I actually had a list of Verein immigrants, and a the 1850 census for Gillespie county which included practically everyone who arrived in Texas under the auspices of the Verein. One of the family surnames - Steinmetz - just popped into my head. The other two surnames - Becker and Richter were proper German family names, and also names of people who were associated with me, or my family. (Becker was the name of a guy on my Uncle James' WWII B-17 crew, and Richter was the name of a broadcaster that I served with at AFKN.) I just pulled Christian names out of the ship-lists and the census. Simple as that, actually - and completely period authentic!
ReplyDeleteI hate to admit it, but they usually tell me their names. When I'm creating a character, I start by visualizing them in some typical situations. After a few days, I find I know their names. The subconscious is a powerful tool.
ReplyDeleteMy name, with a few exceptions, nearly all come from original source material - reading over the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle yields many scores of names, for instance.
ReplyDeleteSince the variety of names in the medieval period tends to be rather limited and I want to avoid "modernisms", I have found "The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names" by EG Withycombe to be very helpful, especially if I want different spellings of the same name to avoid confusion and I get bored with the "of London" appendages.
ReplyDeletePriscilla Royal
"Chambers of Death", the latest Prioress Eleanor/Brother Thomas medieval mystery from Poisoned Pen Press coming in August