- Jun 22, 2022
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I have a character whom we meet at the age of 17 whose name is Parker. For the first seven chapters, that's who he is. But now it's ten years later, he's started a new life and is using his middle name, Jonathan. He introduces himself as Jonny now. But, of course, I've now been calling him Parker for seven chapters. While it's only natural that initially, characters who know him will still think of him as Parker Bishop, it now starts to feel like I'm deadnaming him. For example:
There, it feels natural for Lance to still use Parker. He's shocked. Parker has not become Jonny for him. So how many chapters and self-corrections would it take for Lance to uncomfortably use the word Jon when describing his actions to the reader? To have him mentally keep deadnaming this character is starting to feel almost deliberately hurtful, and proof that Lance is too wrapped up in the memory of their baggage to connect with this character (which might be the case, but it's an avenue I think that would be distracting to the story).
Should the story then be about Parker/Jonny reclaiming the old identity and healing the intense trauma that he endured when people still called him that, or should he live the rest of his life under this new name? Because while many people knew him so little that they would be quick to change, the people he cares about the most, and who knew him the best will likely struggle with it for a while, and distract the reader.
Furthermore, this is First-Person POV. In the chapters where Parker/Jonny speaks, of course the reader can see the inner consistency. He's reinventing himself. But at the head of every chapter, I say who's speaking. Chapter 6, which was Parker's last POV chapter, starts like this, because it hasn't occured to him yet to start going by his middle name--but it's important to the plot that he's reinvented himself and made "Parker Bishop" extremely hard to track down:
When we pick up in Chapter 8, however (after a Lance chapter), and meet Parker again, it's nine years later, and he calls himself this new name, and has for a while. But the reader doesn't know that. So I could call him Parker, like this:
Or, even this:
So, Hive mind, what do you think I should do?
There, it feels natural for Lance to still use Parker. He's shocked. Parker has not become Jonny for him. So how many chapters and self-corrections would it take for Lance to uncomfortably use the word Jon when describing his actions to the reader? To have him mentally keep deadnaming this character is starting to feel almost deliberately hurtful, and proof that Lance is too wrapped up in the memory of their baggage to connect with this character (which might be the case, but it's an avenue I think that would be distracting to the story).
Should the story then be about Parker/Jonny reclaiming the old identity and healing the intense trauma that he endured when people still called him that, or should he live the rest of his life under this new name? Because while many people knew him so little that they would be quick to change, the people he cares about the most, and who knew him the best will likely struggle with it for a while, and distract the reader.
Furthermore, this is First-Person POV. In the chapters where Parker/Jonny speaks, of course the reader can see the inner consistency. He's reinventing himself. But at the head of every chapter, I say who's speaking. Chapter 6, which was Parker's last POV chapter, starts like this, because it hasn't occured to him yet to start going by his middle name--but it's important to the plot that he's reinvented himself and made "Parker Bishop" extremely hard to track down:
When we pick up in Chapter 8, however (after a Lance chapter), and meet Parker again, it's nine years later, and he calls himself this new name, and has for a while. But the reader doesn't know that. So I could call him Parker, like this:
or this:
In which case, the reader will have several beats of, who the fuck is this clown?
Or, even this:
So, Hive mind, what do you think I should do?
