Overthinking: Names

The human co-protagonist in Tales of Mundus, Leon, has been part of my imagination since 2003. He originally had a long and complicated fantasy name, but nobody but Dad and I could pronounce it right. Picking a new name should have been simple...

...of course I over-thought the whole process.

In genre fiction, names are a two edged sword. It cues the reader into the world type. Gandalf the Grey is a title as much as a name. It fits in a world of descriptive names and foreign languages. Mundus is not high fantasy – I needed something a bit more causal.

On the other hand, I didn't want a diminutive like Tim, Will, etc. or worse something that could turn into a nickname. Timmy the wizard sounds like a preteen boy running wild around the castle with the royal children. That just wouldn't do.

I also didn't want a name that symbolized something weird. Every name has roots in real words. Loren comes from Lorene which tracks back to the Latin word for the laurel tree. There's also cultural baggage with names. Consider about the surname Lear. Most of my generation will either think about King Lear from the play or Learjet the airplane makers.

All this factoids and names requirements made quite the mess out of my notes. For a while, Leon didn't have a 'name.' I just thought of him as wizard-who-needs-a-new-name. (It was very awkward to talk about my projects during those days.)

Finally, I went with my gut and used my dad's middle name, Leon. Surprising, it passed all my tests. Leon is not overly common or formal. It's suitable for a grown man in most cultures. If you break it down it's either a translation of 'lion' or a variant of of Leonidas. (I only though about the Greek version because of all the legends I read.)

Most importantly, people can pronounce it right.

Reading Ruined my Attention Span

My parents are to blame. (Yes, it's a cliched story opening, but it's often true.)

After I outgrew Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood and The Magic School Bus, they did the unthinkable. They unplugged all network T.V. If it wasn't on V.H.S., I didn't get to watch it.

Since computer and video games were just hitting the markets, we turned to books. The few exceptions were spelling and math learning software. It wasn't until I turned 13 that I got a Gameboy. However, the damage was done.

By junior high, I had been reading at a high-school level for a couple of years. It wasn't speed reading or skimming either. Fiction/prose is an information dense style. If you skip the middle bit of a paragraph the dialog doesn't make sense.

Mom and Dad's evil plot was working – I had an intense focus ability and enjoyed in depth narratives.

Soon, I went to college and rediscovered commercial television.

…I was not impressed.

Movies weren't too bad, because they were continuous and didn't clutter my memory with jingles and product slogans. (I was taking Engineering prerequisites – free brain space was at a premium) Drama series didn't make the cut.

Plot twists were telegraphed and everything was stuck to the speed of dialogue. Yes, I was reading faster than most people speak.

This made the News unbearable. The President's hour-and-a-half State of the Union speech could be printed, read, and mentally digested in twenty minutes. Why should I watch a guy stand and wave his index finger around when I had stuff to do?

College lectures were my one exception to 'just read the summary or original source.' I attended class to learn the grader's vocabulary and thought structure so I could mimic it for my papers. (Tip for students: If the tone of your essay is close to their 'tone,' you get better grades.)

Studies aside, this 'blah' effect on media sent me back to books. My reading speed increased again. Books and web publications were cheaper to marathon than boxed sets of Lost. The cycle continued.

It wasn't until I was in my mid-twenties that I realized what my parents had done to me. They counter-brainwashed me into preferring information dense media. Even books made into movies are flashy eye candy. All special effects and no depth of world.

Reading is a double edged sword. It chances the way you think and process. Your values and expectations of entertainment also shift. I just don't enjoy T.V.

...I told Mom about this article. She grinned, self-satisfied.