Meaningful names in your fiction.

Looking up the meaning of names can fire up neurons on its own. It can also make for a nice Shout-Out.

One of my villains in an universe I'm brainstorming for is a Practically Joker Mad Scientist and Rubber Woman of Navajo descent named Moira Morgan, named so in part because she leads a secret organization called the Destiny Society to take over the States and run it into the ground for kicks. Even better is that her given name means "destiny".

In my Warrior Cats fanfic idea, The Rising, one of Flightclan's deputies (the villains, there are only two clans), is named Silverflight.

"Silver" comes from him being a silver tabby, which is a standard name origin type in the series. However "-flight" has a double meaning, in addition to referring to flying it can be interpreted as a reference to his cowardly tendencies and the fact that he's always running from something, literally or figuratively.

This is actually unintentional; i realized it later but it works well.

The point I aim for is "names that are meaningful in such a way that you only notice with hindsight and/or very specific outside knowledge". Especially if they're meaningful in a couple of unrelated ways, which has a serendipity to it I find it hard to pass over.

Example: Julia Contreras the Pattern Witch is named after mathematician Gaston Julia, namesake of a famous fractal, and architect José Contreras, who started the restoration of the Alhambra in the mid-1800s. Also, the name Contreras means "opposite area", which is further suggestive of geometry and it amuses me to misconstrue it as "negative space".

The thing that frustrates me is when I find a name which is perfectly fitting in multiple ways but except that one of them is too blatant. Hamilcar is a Carthaginian name meaning "brother of Moloch (god of the city)", Usher is an obscure religious title and more generally a job of helping people reach their assigned positions as well as a famous gothic horror story connecting spiritual and architectural decay, these are all very appropriate, unfortunately it's so obvious that Hamilcar Usher is also a Hannibal Lecter expy that all the other subtleties feel wasted and it's infuriating. (You'd think this would be a rare problem! You would be mistaken!)

Very simplistic one here and more of a meaningful alias but I have OKAMI, whose power is turning into a wolf.

I named the protagonist of my NaNoWriMo novel Vinnie Sayre. Vinnie is a reference to Vincent van Gogh and Sayre was Zelda Fitzgerald's maiden name. Both were troubled artists that suffered with mental issues, just like Vinnie. I'll also say that Vinnie'a appearance was inspired by Van Gogh but girl and has a sunflower motif going on.

I also named Vinnie's adoptive family after Van Gogh's family and her two friends are named Oei Hiroshige and Pauline Bernard. Oei's namesakes are Katsushika Ōi, the daughter of famous Ukiyo-e artist Hokusai, and Hiroshige, another Ukiyo-e artist who Van Gogh was a big fan of. Pauline's namesakes are Paul Gauguin and Émile Bernard French Post-Impressionist artists and friends of Van Gogh.

I have a couple more but they're a bit spoilerly, so I'll hold off.

Edited by Cutegirl920fire on Nov 9th 2022 at 6:46:32 AM

I guess I'm the only one that uses and likes meaningful names?

Edited by MrsDoubtfire1200 on Nov 12th 2022 at 1:42:51 PM

No? The thread has had a few people noting that they employ such names, I believe.

Red Revenge also features a character whose surname, Marchegiano, ultimately means "from borderland". It's befitting since he's both a Half-Human Hybrid, and an outcast everywhere he goes (both because of his clearly inhuman appearance, and because of his dickishness).

Edited by Nukeli on Dec 10th 2022 at 8:01:04 PM

Not too on the nose, but a character named Jason tjat figuratively heals stuff, like relationships.

Sometimes! I occasionally like to look at the meanings of names and find ones that fit a character's personality or other aspects. Some are more subtle than others.

Given I write a story about a World of Funny Animals, Species Surnames in some shape or form are pretty common alongside real world surnames. It causes a bit of Aerith and Bob at times.