[Usain "Quick Ben" Bolt]

Why did Steven Erikson have to name a character in this book Buruk the Pale, while in other books there is a character name Baruk. I was too lazy to go and check until i was done the book but due to the style of Steven I am always try to guess connections and I was waiting to be told it was the same person. Why such close names?!?!

[Kanese S's]

Probably just to mess with you.

[MTS]

It's not like it's uncommon. As well as that one there's Rell/Rel, Skinner/Shimmer, Lim Tal/Councilman Lim, Lean/Leal, Coil/Cowl, Banath/Beneth/Beneth, Orlat/Korlat, Chord/Cord, Trench/Trenech, Dim/Dim, Quint/Squint...there's plenty more but I believe my point has been made. ICE seems particularly guilty of it, featuring in all of those examples. I think there's even two Shards and two Faros as well as a Mane and a Greymane...

This post has been edited by MTS: 11 July 2011 - 06:32 AM

[Gust Hubb]

 MTS, on 11 July 2011 - 06:30 AM, said:

It's not like it's uncommon. As well as that one there's Rell/Rel, Skinner/Shimmer, Lim Tal/Councilman Lim, Lean/Leal, Coil/Cowl, Banath/Beneth/Beneth, Orlat/Korlat, Chord/Cord, Trench/Trenech, Dim/Dim, Quint/Squint...there's plenty more but I believe my point has been made. ICE seems particularly guilty of it, featuring in all of those examples. I think there's even two Shards and two Faros as well as a Mane and a Greymane...

Careful. Coil and Cowl are different characters!

[Abyss]

Mock/Mok/Toc/Nok.

'nuff said.

Altho Shul and Shool over in SW took the cake.

[Bauchelain the Evil]

and of course Pearl/Pearl beats them all. Especially if we add Bluepearl.

This post has been edited by Bauchelain the Evil: 11 July 2011 - 04:00 PM

[Seatiger]

OMG thats so great I was gonna ask about the Pearl/Pearl thing since I just got done reading that in TTH a few pages back was confusing as all @#$%^

[Sinisdar Toste]

 Abyss, on 11 July 2011 - 02:59 PM, said:

Mock/Mok/Toc/Nok.

'nuff said.

Altho Shul and Shool over in SW took the cake.

those two were kinda 'huh?' but then i just started pronouncing 'Shul' the way it's spelt and got on with my life

i don't worry to much about name repeats; since i have to distinguish between about 7 amy's and 10 john's in my real life, i figure, if SE and ICE think that certain phoneme configurations should be common in their world, that's their prerogative. especially since pearl/pearl are just amazing characters.

what i do like, on the other hand, is names crossing from one author to another. came up a couple times in Way of Kings. cenn (boy soldier in WoK) and cenn (buie, you know him). then there's one that's kind of funny to me: shen (a parshmen bridgeman in WoK) and shen (from Cook's The Silver Spike). one is literally emotionless and barely cognizant, the other is a jumpy small-time crook who learns how to hang with the big-boys. when raven describes the way shen offed his cousin near the end, i just howl.

This post has been edited by Sinisdar Toste: 12 July 2011 - 02:40 AM

[MTS]

 Sinisdar Toste, on 12 July 2011 - 02:30 AM, said:

what i do like, on the other hand, is names crossing from one author to another. came up a couple times in Way of Kings. cenn (boy soldier in WoK) and cenn (buie, you know him). then there's one that's kind of funny to me: shen (a parshmen bridgeman in WoK) and shen (from Cook's The Silver Spike). one is literally emotionless and barely cognizant, the other is a jumpy small-time crook who learns how to hang with the big-boys. when raven describes the way shen offed his cousin near the end, i just howl.

Don't forget ROTCG's Shen.

[Sinisdar Toste]

 MTS, on 12 July 2011 - 07:52 AM, said:

 Sinisdar Toste, on 12 July 2011 - 02:30 AM, said:

what i do like, on the other hand, is names crossing from one author to another. came up a couple times in Way of Kings. cenn (boy soldier in WoK) and cenn (buie, you know him). then there's one that's kind of funny to me: shen (a parshmen bridgeman in WoK) and shen (from Cook's The Silver Spike). one is literally emotionless and barely cognizant, the other is a jumpy small-time crook who learns how to hang with the big-boys. when raven describes the way shen offed his cousin near the end, i just howl.

Don't forget ROTCG's Shen.

agh! too many shen's! maybe they're all the same guy? like hoid, but with different authors. a literary tape worm.

[D'iversify]

I think the problem lies in the fact that mono- and bisyllabic names are pretty common in real world terms, and also that in the West the regional variations of a few Christian and pre-Christian names are fairly dominant (e.g. Peter, Pedro, Pyotr), so there's quite a lot of samey names about. So it makes sense to have quite a few in your fantasy world (unless yours is a world where everyone's got names that translate as something like 'He-who-fishes-on-the-right-bank-of-the-great-salmon-lake-and-is-beloved-of-the-marmot-god'). But then when you have massive casts, the temptation to be rather unimaginative can set in, and thus you get character lists in which a quarter of the people on them are some variation of Rell, Mell or Bell.

[Scerakor]

Another one that got me in MT was Wither/Withal.

[Ruthan Good]

I know many Daves, Mikes, Bills and Wills, Stevens and Stephens. Jons and Johns. The list goes on.

[tiam]

Also there are continental names. Like Beneth in Skullcap is Korelri and when we get to Korel we get another character named Beneth.

[Kanese S's]

Might just be the "John" or "Bob" of that language.

[Jagh-o-matic]

Wither/Withal + Wyval was pretty horrendous on the first read.

No one has yet mentioned my personal favorite, however:

Kenryllah
Kenyllrah

(pretentious apostrophes omitted)

[K'chain Paladin]

 Jagh-o-matic, on 04 June 2013 - 08:19 PM, said:

Wither/Withal + Wyval was pretty horrendous on the first read.

No one has yet mentioned my personal favorite, however:

Kenryllah
Kenyllrah

(pretentious apostrophes omitted)

Dear Lord the demon names are the absolute worst.

[Egwene]

I am just glad that overall the names are pronounceable - even if only in my head!

Rather than calling repeat of names unimaginative, I think it's authors taking it easy. After all, if you have ten characters by the name of John and fifteen with the name Smith... how on earth do you keep track on who said what to whom and when

[Abyss]

 Egwene, on 09 October 2014 - 08:32 PM, said:

I am just glad that overall the names are pronounceable - even if only in my head!

Rather than calling repeat of names unimaginative, I think it's authors taking it easy. After all, if you have ten characters by the name of John and fifteen with the name Smith... how on earth do you keep track on who said what to whom and when

See aelso aelll the Aegons, Aeryns, aend similar nameless in Song of Ice aend Fire.

[Syphonics]

 K, on 28 September 2014 - 02:56 AM, said:

 Jagh-o-matic, on 04 June 2013 - 08:19 PM, said:

Wither/Withal + Wyval was pretty horrendous on the first read.

No one has yet mentioned my personal favorite, however:

Kenryllah
Kenyllrah

(pretentious apostrophes omitted)

Dear Lord the demon names are the absolute worst.

These are pretty bad, but out of all of the ones listed I feel they matter the least. As I recall, Kenryllah and Kenyllrah just indicated rank, so at least they weren't individual names.