I Approve Of This Message.

[theweaselking]

"All apostrophes in the middle of fantasy names are now to be pronounced "boing."

That is all."

Comments

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

It's a glottal stop, you weenies.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Not the way most fantasy writers use it.

[cleodhna.livejournal.com]

Yes. That.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Probably, but it's not as embarrassing as "boing".

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I believe the embarassment is the point. If even one new Doboingurden is prevented, this rule has been justified.

[errolwi.livejournal.com]

Yes, you have a different reaction when you talk with people with one in their names (Samoans) on most days.

[queenanthai.livejournal.com]

CeBoingNedra disapproves.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Salvatore's work is embarrassing enough on its own. And i just don't need the mental boings.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

Does this apply to fantasy set in Ireland?

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

My happiest memory of Baldur's Gate 1 was figuring out the easy way to solo that abomination of a Mary Sue. It was a very slow death, but that just made it all the more worthwhile.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I believe that Ireland, not being fictional, may get an exemption.

It depends on the name.

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Define "solo". I surrounded him on all four sides with NPCs, dismissed them from the party so he wouldn't attack them and they wouldn't move, then stood slightly outside his sword range and slightly inside halberd range and poked him to death over the course of like an hour.

[skington.livejournal.com]

It's all the fault of the Tolnedrans. Had she kept a proper dryad name, she'd merely be XNedra. (Which, admittedly, would be the local equivalent of being called Mrs Jesus, but Eddings was rubbish at thinking of three names when one would do.)

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

No shortage of Jesuses and Mohammeds out there.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

That's exactly the tactic I used (though from memory, I think I had to use five NPCs to box him in).

If they didn't mean for us to do that, why on earth would they have put him in the middle of a pile of dead gnolls with halberds?

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Technically, I put about two hundred arrows into him before realizing that halberds would do too (and would need to, since the two hundred arrows hadn't killed him), but I know you can do it with four people. Because I was playing multiplayer with one other person, and both PCs were stabbing at him.

[jerril]

Yes, but they usually come with extra names to go with Jesus or Mohammed - if nothing else, to facilitate telling them apart from all the various other Jesuses and Mohammeds, including but not limited to their namesakes.

Someone who just names their kid "Jesus", instead of "Jesus Jones"? Or worse, someone who changes their name to just "Jesus"? They generally register pretty highly on peoples "that's weird"-o-meter.

[jerril]

Most Samoans aren't fantasy characters, so it doesn't apply to them. It doesn't apply to 'San either, where it's a click instead of a glottal stop - because the 'San are also mostly not fantasy characters.

I say "mostly aren't" because I'm sure there has to be some Samoan and 'San fantasy out there...

[maelorin]

approved!

especially for those authors who think adding a ' or a " to a name makes it more 'elvan' or whatever o.O

[i've not read any fantasy genre (beyond 'official' reports) for some time. not sure that even boing can rescue the work of a great many authors.]

[willplant.livejournal.com]

There's a San character in the Tad Williams Otherworld series

[ipslore.livejournal.com]

In fact, why don't we generalize it a bit. Just as 'bang' is the name of the ! symbol, let's make 'boing' the name of the ' symbol.

[queenanthai.livejournal.com]

Actually, it would just be XBoingNedra. Still an apostrophe, just spelled differently in Tolnedra rather than the Wood.

[iblis-kukl.livejournal.com]

[harper-knight.livejournal.com]

I think the Dragonriders get a pass. Because unlike the weird fantasy names that have ' in them (usually for no good (or any) reason whatever, and completely ignored in any pronunciation that can be spoken by a human), the ' in Dragonriders' names are there because they traditionally take on a shortened version of their birth name when they Impress. I think that's a good enough reason to count as reasonable use.

I just finished re-reading the original Ninth Pass books. Damn, those are great books.