So Much Depends...

I started responding to a comment, and then realized I could make a whole post about this very topic. So that's what I'm doing.

Names are a very interesting part of who we are. In many ways, they define who we are, sometimes dictating how we act, who we associate with, and how we are viewed by others and ourselves.

When I write fiction I take all of this into consideration. It is one of the many aspects about writing that can be so irritating, that makes writing so difficult. In a particular piece I'm working on right now, each name has been chosen with great care. I choose names differently depending on the character. Sometimes it's all about the meaning. Sometimes it's in the symbology. Sometimes it has to do with the way particular names sound and how they would affect the other characters. Sometimes it's about association. Names sometimes come to me in a moment of wonderful inspiration, like a stroke of genius, if I do say so myself. This happened in the case of the two main characters of the piece I'm currently working on. But this is a very rare occurrence. With all of the other characters, I've had to try out different names, sometimes several times, until I find just the right fit. Sometimes a name seems so perfect for a particular character, and then as I begin developing the character even more, it becomes so obviously the wrong name. As strange as it sounds, sometimes I place temporary names until the characters "tell" me what they want their names to be. It's a tricky business.

In "553," I chose names based on the way the names sounded. One syllable names such as John, Khord, and Ode all represent the stark world of a mental hospital and the one-sidedness of the characters. Edith, Alma, Irene, and Margaret, even Larry and Mrs. Wellington, have multi-syllable names to contrast with the starkness of the hospital.

So that's the short version of my naming process, at least the character naming process. Choosing a title is more difficult because so much depends on a title. After all, we really do judge books by their covers, and often by their titles.