Hmm.

[katallison]

OK, I'm still trying to write a Vividcon con report, with marked lack of success, but in the meantime -- I'm very curious about something I've come across a couple of times lately in LJ comments, and that is the issue of the name you use to refer to a character when you're writing a close-3rd-person-POV story about that character.

Ahem. Let me see if I can be clearer. Say I'm writing a story in 3rd person about Fraser, where he's the POV character. I always refer to him as "Fraser" because that's, y'know, what I call the guy. But I've seen a couple of people lately saying that in such situations the name used should be the one that the character himself uses when he thinks about himself, so the question is does he think of himself as Fraser, or Ben, or Benton, or whatever?

See, in my head this is kind of, sort of, related to the issue flambeau was talking about a while ago (here, to be specific), where you can't sneak in descriptive stuff by having the POV character musing about his own tautly muscled abs or emerald eyes or whatever, or on the other hand providing detailed descriptions of scenes he regularly moves through and is familiar with to the point of obliviousness. You have to maintain the authenticity/integrity of the character's own awareness. And one could argue, I guess, that using the name the character would use about himself inwardly is part of that authenticity-maintenance, except -- I dunno, I just have never thought of it that way. It feels strange to me, and I'd love to hear others' views.

Comments

Re: If I'm OK, the rest of you must be odd

[septembergrrl.livejournal.com]

I think of myself as Beth, which is what I was called as a child.

I don't have an opinion about due south (I got to this post from my friend's list), but I agree that Scully thinks of herself as Dana, and Mulder thinks of himself as Mulder. He just made it too clear he did not like the name Fox (well, who would?), whereas Scully seemed to only go by her last name in the professional context.

I'm mostly from Buffy fandom. I think Giles *probably* thinks of himself as Rupert or Ripper most of the time, but I wouldn't put money on it or anything. I can't remember -- what did Olivia and Jenny call him?

[suzecarol.livejournal.com]

But that doesn't necessarily follow. You're taking your personal preferences and saying that since that's what you do, that's what *everyone* does.

I prefer to be called Susan or Suze, and I make sure the people around me know that. I can get quite huffy with people who call me Sue -- more than once anyway -- and Suzie positively makes me cringe. But I *think* of myself, in my interior monologue (which is, ultimately, what we're talking about isn't it?) as 'me' or 'I', not Susan or Suze.

Just because someone expresses a preference as to what they want other people to call them, doesn't mean that's how they refer to themselves in their *thoughts.* Yes, for some people, as your case points out, it does; but you can't assume it works that way for for everyone. As obviously, my case being the example, it doesn't. And unless they tell you, or you can read their thoughts, you don't know how another person -- including Mulder, Scully, and Giles -- thinks of themself.

[septembergrrl.livejournal.com]

But that doesn't necessarily follow. You're taking your personal preferences and saying that since that's what you do, that's what *everyone* does.

I didn't mean to say that -- I was just commenting. Sorry if I came off as freakishly strident.

And no, I can't read thoughts, but isn't this whole discussion about assumptions?

FMC

[suzecarol.livejournal.com]

No, it's not. As Merry pointed out, it's about "the possible impact of choices."

But our assumptions alwys seem to sneak into these discussions, don't they? *g*