Character Names

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Paul Whybrow

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Jun 20, 2015
Cornwall, UK
I previously touched on the naming of characters, and I remain convinced that giving your protagonist and antagonist memorable names is crucial to any success your story may have.

Clickbait is a modern term to describe a headline link to internet content that's often not quite what you thought it would be. It exploits what is known as the curiosity gap, an aspect of marketing that we should bear in mind when working on titles and character names.

With a book, the title is the first piece of bait to tempt a reader to bite. I'd suggest that having a memorable name for your hero and your villain is the second hook. It would certainly help, if your name as an author is unforgettable, but I bet that more readers recall Harry Potter than his creator's name J. K. Rowling.

I'm currently having fun creating a new baddy in my WIP The Dead Need Nobody, a cold, manipulative misogynist art dealer who uses female art students to create forgeries, before killing them. He's the most covert murderer I've written about, as he's a wealthy member of the establishment in Saint Ives and is highly respected on the international art scene.

I thought to make him even more sneaky via his name, which is Tobias Taube. Tobias derives from a Greek version of a Hebrew biblical name, that means 'Goodness of God', while Taube means 'Dove' in German and is sometimes applied as a nickname to a meek and mild person. As the dove is a universally recognised symbol of peace, my homicidal art gallery owner trades on it, by using a dove colophon on his business cards and having carved dove heads on his gallery's door posts.

In the strange way that a writer's mind works, I first came across the word Taube 50 years ago, when I was avidly interested in WW1 fighter aircraft. The Rumpler Taube had wings shaped like a dove's. I thought, at the time, that it would make a great name for a character in a book, and now it is!

The master of memorable names for characters is Charles Dickens, several of whom entered the language as symbolic of certain behaviour, such as Scrooge, Miss Havisham and Fagin. Dickens' propensity for creating daft names, such as Uncle Pumblechook, Charity Pecksniff and Reverend Melchisedech Howler does leave him open to parody. Astonishingly enough, in The Old Curiosity Shop there's a character called Dick Swiveller, who in Chapter 7 'with difficulty ejaculated.' :eek:




Have you come up with any intriguing character names, that may, one day, enter the minds of millions of readers?
 
My husband gifted me the name Sparklebottom Brisket for the name of a witch in my MG novel The Ipswich Witch (I had previously been calling her Dolores). My dragon name, Foggy Bottom, has gotten lots of comments and giggles from the MG readers of The Dragon Slayer's Son.
 
I'm currently having fun creating a new baddy in my WIP The Dead Need Nobody, a cold, manipulative misogynist art dealer who uses female art students to create forgeries, before killing them. He's the most covert murderer I've written about, as he's a wealthy member of the establishment in Saint Ives and is highly respected on the international art scene.

That doesn't sound half bad.

I thought to make him even more sneaky via his name, which is Tobias Taube. Tobias derives from a Greek version of a Hebrew biblical name, that means 'Goodness of God', while Taube means 'Dove' in German and is sometimes applied as a nickname to a meek and mild person. As the dove is a universally recognised symbol of peace, my homicidal art gallery owner trades on it, by using a dove colophon on his business cards and having carved dove heads on his gallery's door posts.

Interesting.

The master of memorable names for characters is Charles Dickens, several of whom entered the language as symbolic of certain behaviour, such as Scrooge, Miss Havisham and Fagin. Dickens' propensity for creating daft names, such as Uncle Pumblechook, Charity Pecksniff and Reverend Melchisedech Howler does leave him open to parody. Astonishingly enough, in The Old Curiosity Shop there's a character called Dick Swiveller, who in Chapter 7 'with difficulty ejaculated.' :eek:


It sounds like he didn't like picking names for his characters.

Have you come up with any intriguing character names, that may, one day, enter the minds of millions of readers?

Yeah. I don't think so. I hate picking names. But I have a current favorite: Arqbaht Sloane. It belongs to a peripheral character. Oh, and I also like the name Fatimah--but only if it's pronounced FAT i MAH and not Fa TEE Ma.
 
I love naming characters! One of my favourite things about writing. My current main character is named Sylvia Valentine and her sister is named Vivien; I have synaesthesia and both of those names are like mauve velvet to me. Fun fact: I used to want to name my future daughter Sylvia Valentine!
 
I'm hopeless at picking names. I usually resort to random picking in a book of names I have until I get one that sounds OK.
Several of my novel attempts I have not given the POV character a name at all, and one or two I have decided half way through the writing that the name didn't fit at all.
I tend to stick with normal, everyday names and resist the temptation to think up something outlandish.
Douglas Adams had a particular talent as you have noticed. Zaphod Beebblebrox is hard to beat. An outlandish name for an outlandish character.
 
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