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

[chicating.livejournal.com]

I think so, probably. And I think Giles thinks of himself as Giles sometimes. He uses it more than the name he was born to, certainly. And I get to cheat a lot on this issue because I've written about cops who are all last name, a lot. But still Bayliss is "Tim" a lot more than Munch is "John"

[septembergrrl.livejournal.com]

He uses it more than the name he was born to, certainly.

Does he? I just checked the script archive, and it looks like people he would consider an equal (Joyce, Jenny Calendar, Olivia, Ethan Rayne, other CoW members) tend to call him Rupert. In his dream in "Restless," Willow calls him Rupert, too.

I think he's like Dana Scully in this way -- we see him in contexts where he's called by his last name, but that doesn't mean he would normally go by it, if that makes sense.

[umbo.livejournal.com]

But still Bayliss is "Tim" a lot more than Munch is "John"

You are so very, very right. But Meldrick is Meldrick as much as he is Lewis, I think.

[chicating.livejournal.com]

Right. Definitely.