What’s in a name?

A fantasy novel that includes a convincing, original imaginary world AND a great story AND complex, memorable characters is a treat to be savoured. Sadly, for every one of those I discover, there are ten books I can’t get through. Poor research in fields I know about, such as music, is one major turn-off, and wayward choice of character and place names is another.

Hang on, you say – in an invented world, doesn’t anything go? If I make up a language, a mode of speech, a set of names, they belong to me, the author, and it’s not up to anyone else to say they do or don’t work.

Not so, at least not in the opinion of this rather picky reader. A slapdash approach to the linguistic framework of an invented world will turn me and others like me right off your book. The most basic tenet of fantasy worlds is that they should be internally consistent. You need not be Tolkien to achieve this in your naming. A philologist has the advantage over most of us in inventing languages. But I believe a basic knowledge of the way languages work is an essential tool for a fantasy writer.

I’m not saying your characters should speak in Elvish or equivalent – just that the character and place names within one realm / culture should sound as if they have the same linguistic origins. If you create several realms or cultures you need to do this for each of them. Think about the Mediterranean region, and how diverse the languages are within a fairly narrow geographic span. If you know even a little about languages, you can guess from someone’s name whether they come from France, Greece, Turkey or Egypt.

Fantasy writers often choose names from various real world cultures, contemporary or historical. Other writers invent names – this can work well if a logical set of linguistic rules is applied to their construction. Using The Lord of the Rings as an example, the Orcish names use only certain combinations of vowels and consonants, u, a, k, z and g being common. Elvish is rich in i, e, l, m and n. That’s a superficial analysis of complex linguistic work. But it shows how setting up rules for the character and place names of your culture can give them an authentic ring.

One thing that ruins a book for me is the mixing of names from assorted ‘real world’ cultures within a single ‘invented world’ culture. Some of our best known writers do this boldly (and people buy their books, which does make me think perhaps I’m a dinosaur from the time when we studied foreign languages at school and most readers were familiar with world geography, mythology, Bible stories and Shakespeare.) You really love the names Isabella, Caitlin, Xenophon and Ramses? Fine, but please don’t use them for siblings unless your novel is set in the hippie era! With some writers, sloppy naming goes alongside wayward, illogical mixing of real world botany and zoology, and a general mish-mash of cultural details.

Some authors get it fabulously right. Often that’s a result of creating a world that is very close to the real one but with a few striking differences. Jacqueline Carey’s Terre d’Ange and surrounding lands in Kushiel’s Dart and its sequels form an imaginatively realised version of early Renaissance Europe, complete with entirely convincing names and cultures; Guy Gavriel Kay’s The Lions of El Rassan is (almost) a historical novel set in Moorish Spain, full of well-researched detail. Place and character names reflect real cultures but are inventions; a second moon in the sky lets us know we are not actually in real history.

All writers can benefit from a knowledge of languages other than the one they write in; from reading as widely as possible, including great works of literature from other cultures; from becoming informed about the world beyond their own desks, communities and countries. For fantasy writers, much of whose craft consists of making the impossible appear possible, this kind of background not only adds depth to the work but makes writing a whole lot easier.

Footnote: Nobody’s perfect. I know there are naming errors in some of my books!

Illustration provided by Dreamstime.com.

Juliet Marillier

Juliet Marillier has written twenty-four novels for adults and young adults and two collections of short fiction. Her works of historical fantasy have been published around the world and have won numerous awards. Juliet’s most recent series was Warrior Bards, of which the third and final book, A Song of Flight, was published in 2021. Her collection of reimagined fairy tales, Mother Thorn and Other Tales of Courage and Kindness, had its trade release in  2022. Mother Thorn is illustrated by Kathleen Jennings and published by Serenity Press.
Juliet is currently working on a two-book fantasy series. The first book in this duology, The Amber Owl, will be published by New Dawn in February 2025.
When not writing, Juliet looks after a small crew of rescue dogs.

www.julietmarillier.com