Far be it from me to disagree with Shakespeare, but I do. I don't think a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, in fact, I'd go even further than that. I think a rose by any other name would be something completely different.
Names are crucial. More than that, they define us. A Susan is a different person from a Violet. A James is a different man than a George.
Numerologists deal with both your birth name but even more importantly the name you choose for yourself. So if your name is Kathleen (like mine), but you call yourself Kathie, that will mean one thing. If you call yourself Kate, that will be another. And if your child's name is Robert, you could call him Rob or Bob or Bobby or Robert - all of those things will define who he is.
My sister grew up as Sandra - and in the past five years she has changed her name to Sandy. She's chosen to change her name because she works with children and Sandy is a more friendly and easier name for children to use. But it's changed her as well. Is it the job? Is it the name change? I suspect it's a little bit of both.
I think about this when I'm writing a new character. If her name is Susan, what does she get called by the love of her life? Sue? Susan? or something else completely?
I think about this when I'm naming a town - there's a big different between a coastal town called Secret Cove and one called Gibsons Landing. They're both interesting, but there's a built in assumption that is made by the reader (or the visitor) when they hear the name of a place. I often choose holiday destinations by their name - I can remember pouring over maps of France and Italy and choosing to spend a night in a place whose name I loved.
I can remember when I was a teenager planning - as we all do - my future wedding and spending months deciding on the name of my groom. I can't remember what my decision was, though it was probably something like Leonard (or Leonardo to make it closer to Romeo) because I was in love with Romeo in Franco Zefferelli's version of Romeo and Juliet.
And thus, as always, back to Shakespeare. Sorry, big guy, but the rose isn't a rose if it's called something else. It's an altogether different flower. You were wrong - but you know what? I forgive you. It doesn't happen often.
What about your name? Your characters' names? Your childrens' names?
Kate
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7 comments:
Names are interesting. I used to hate my name, Annette, if you take the meaning of my first and middle names, it translates to graceful bitterness. lol
But over the years, I've grown to love my first name. It's me, I think if I had changed my first name, I wouldn't quite be me.
nd, I think that's one of the things that takes us time to figure out - whether our name suits us, works for us - or not. When we're kids, I don't think we think about it too much, but as we get older, for sure we do. It's great that your name is YOU.
Kate
I have accepted my first name, Jane, but when I was younger, I wanted to be Elizabeth like my mother and grandmother. Hubby and I mostly gave out children names that we liked (and we had a hard time agreeing on our second son's name!). We held on to our daughter's name, Lyra Anne, through two sons. (Now she is wrestling with whether or not to hypenate her last name when she gets married next month.)
Names have always been very important to me, to the point that if a fictional character's name doesn't seem right, I have trouble enjoying the book. When I am writing, I will use first person partly to avoid coming up with a good name for a character. (Bad habit, I know.) I keep a baby name book on my desk to help with the naming.
As a kid, I hated my name. I was one of umpteen Lisas and my middle name, Ann, didn't even have an e to make in interesting.
Naming my characters is always fairly easy; most of them tend to name themselves. For the more reticent, I don't use a book, but have several online names sites bookmarked.
Terms of endearment, I think, say as much - if not more - about the character using them than about the character on the recieving end.
nomadicdragon, I love your first name. :)
When my daughter was born, we had three names picked out: Scott, Keith & Glen. There hadn't been a female born to our Blair family in 6 generations. But I had a girl. We called her baby for three days. My husband's name is Robert; his grandmother's last name: Robinson. We named her Robbie-Lynn. My teenage sisters said "She'll love it."
She hated it. Until she went to high school and got to join "The Hyphen Club" where she met all her best friends. Now she loves it.
I work hard to give my characters the names that belong to them. I had Harmony & Destiny in a blink but I think it took me two months to find Storm for my third triplet. It fit.
ps: Scott was born two years later.
I am a Patricia Marie, but... Growing up, I was called Patsy and I really don't like that name. My family are the only ones who call me that now. Have gone by Pat to everyone else since high school. Our oldest daughter is Rebecca. I wanted her middle name to be Fairlight (a character from a book), but the nurse said Rebecca Fairlight Barraclough would not fit on the forms and wouldn't put it down. We pulled Lynn out of the air and it goes OK, but I still like the first choice better.
Our second daughter is Erin Corinne, both names from the Waltons TV series. Erin was one of the daughters. There was a sweet old lady in one show that I fell in love with. Her name was Martha Corinne. Martha didn't work as a middle name for Erin, but Corinne works well. Our son is Mathew Walter. Walter was my husband's father's name. It is not really one I would have considered, but works well with Mathew.
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