Use of Real names for Things for second world Fantasy

[jedellion]

In the approximate words of Orson Scott Card, "If it looks like a rabbit, acts like a rabbit, just call it a rabbit!" I've probably mauled the quote.

But essentially, in his book on creative writing, he reminds us that our characters and worlds are fictional and would have their own distinct langauge. but we can't write or read in that language, and ultimately a book is for the readers to read and understand, so keep it simple and unambiguous.

 

[Steerpike]

I don’t change the name when it comes to things like rabbits. See the rabbit/smeerp post by Malik. I’ve typically seen that comment attributed to James Blish.

For a proper noun like Mars or Jupiter, I think it make sense to change it. If your character looks at the night sky and sees the planet Jupiter, readers will be justified in thinking your story is set in an alternate version of our real solar system.

 

[jedellion]

I might have got the quote mangled, I have so much junk in my head.

 

[Steerpike]

I might have got the quote mangled, I have so much junk in my head.

I think the general idea is correct--I believe I saw some variation of the 'rabbit' quote in an OSC book at one point. I think it originated with James Blish, but I am not sure how much stock to put in such attributions to begin with.

 

[Rosemary Tea]

By all means, call it a rabbit if you want your reader to picture a rabbit. Calling it anything else would complicate it way too much.

If your story is set on a planet where rabbits don't exist but a similar creature does, you don't have to call it a rabbit, but you might call it something that brings rabbit to mind: sand hare, for instance. (Google tells me there is a fantasy beast called that.)

I'm playing with that a little for my wip, since it's set on an alternate earth. Planets are called what they're called in real life, no need to change that, and rabbits are still rabbits, but some names get altered. For instance, a character sees the poisonous rattletail snake. Not rattlesnake, although it's really the same thing. I altered the name to evoke a slightly different reality. And, since this is an alternate earth, the animals don't necessarily adhere to their respective continents. A rattletail snake might eat a hedgehog, although in our world, they aren't found in the same parts: hedgehogs live in Europe and rattlesnakes in the Americas.

 

[Malik]

a character sees the poisonous rattletail snake. Not rattlesnake, although it's really the same thing. I altered the name to evoke a slightly different reality.

Similarly, I point out that the local word for "pegasus" translates to horsebird. Soldiers refer to winged horses and gryphons--both ridden by the militaries of different countries--as "birds," the same way our soldiers refer to helicopters as "birds."

 

[Demesnedenoir]

I am semi-selective with what I use and don’t use. At my editor’s behest, I rid the text of “earth” even though it doesn’t mean Earth. In once instance I have a Foundations character uses the word “godfist” while seeking the word in Edan, which is keystone in an arch.As far as animals go, I need a good raeson to change their name. It isnt worth the hassle. A critter like a griffon or pegasus I’m probably going to use the term everyone knows since it’s a very specific reference. The word troll, on the other hand, I will not use becaues it creates a very different image in different readers. So, I give it my own name and describe what I want it to be without preconceived notions. It’s really by feel and my own perceived need, LOL.

 

[FifthView]

Everything depends on the tone you are going for.

I can imagine a secondary world having Jupiter and Mars and Mercury as named planets--but it would probably come off as a parallel world, i.e. a kind of parallel universe. This is particularly true if many other aspects of the world point to a world that is not and has never been the Earth. I do think that would need to be handled carefully. Other things would need to be "crossover," so to speak, with many things being unique to that new world.

On a different note...I wonder if the issue might fall to concrete vs abstract terms. Road, sun, rabbit, tree are words meant to signify concrete objects, albeit in a generic way. But Abbey Road, Sol or Betelgeuse, Brachylagus idahoensis, and giant sequoia, although also signifying actual things, have various abstract attachments. Or perhaps it's a generic concrete vs cultural thing, since the abstraction in these cases is a result of cultural elements. Of those examples, I'm less likely to stumble much over a simple "sequoia" inclusion; perhaps this is because I'm personally far away from the cultural element and now read that as a kind of generic term for giant trees. (Curiously, "giant sequoia" tips it over for me. The modifier makes the term too Earthy for me.)

 

[FifthView]

Addendum: To throw a wrench into my own previous comment...Sanderson would say that "tree" is more abstract than "sequoia" because it is more generic!

Well yes, that's true and a valuable way of looking at these terms.

You might then say the more specific terms are more likely to seem more specific to the Earth!

Also true, I think. Much of the time at least. German Shepherd is Earthy. Chihuahua, also. But I think poodle might squeak by.*

But my odd brain feels the abstraction in Abbey Road or giant sequoia. Perhaps I am only too aware of the cultural elements and attachments--i.e., fairly abstract things stirring under the surfaces of those terms. And these associations feel specific to the Earth.

*Some late edits to the original thought. Now I think we could have a fun forum game, with one thread labeled "Squeaks By" and another labeled "Doesn't Squeak By."

 

[Prince of Spires]

There is no hard and fast rule you can use for this. It all comes down to your setting and the images you want to invoke in your reader. If in the first paragraph of a novel I have a character wield a katana, the reader will get a very different image of the world compared to when he's wielding a rapier or a longsword. All three terms are valid for a sword, but which one to use depends on the setting. If I want to take my readers to a medieval english fantasy setting I should never have my character use a katana, no matter how much his sword is one. He might have a single edged, damaskus steel, curved sword.

The same with the rabbit. If a creature is a plain rabbit, then just call it a rabbit. However, if I want to show some worldbuilding and the creature is slightly different from a rabbit, call it something else. Maybe there's a reason these creatures can jump a lot higher than earth rabbits. Or they are poisonous to eat for some worldbuilding reason. Then, call them something else. A reader will gloss over a rabbit, but if you have a small, white, furry tweerp which can jump 5 feet high and is extremely poisonous, then your reader will notice when you mention a tweerp.

Place names are an interesting one (counting planets here as place names). They invoke a very specific image and there would be no reason for them to exist in a fantasy world (unless it's some kind of alternate reality). Which is why you have to be very careful in using them.

 

[Chasejxyz]

He might have a single edged, damaskus steel, curved sword.

Well "Damascus" is a real place, but "damaskus" is not, so maybe the latter would be able to get the point across without seeming too earth-y?

Since I've started working on this project I've been thinking about this again. The aesthetic I want to go for is that Victorian/Edwardian European darkness you'd see in ye olde monster stories. All the character names have been pretty European, so maybe I'll use some ye olde Frenche words (since they ALSO just used the Roman god names for planets in more modern French). I used French names/words as the basis for Bird Language words in my other project so I have some experience in doing that. Bilingual bonus easter eggs, I guess?

 

[Demesnedenoir]

This is one I fudged around by simply mentioning patterned steel, if I recall correctly. Nonspecific, but if I read it, I would be thinking Damascus... no idea what oher folks might think, but I ran with it.

Well "Damascus" is a real place, but "damaskus" is not, so maybe the latter would be able to get the point across without seeming too earth-y?

Since I've started working on this project I've been thinking about this again. The aesthetic I want to go for is that Victorian/Edwardian European darkness you'd see in ye olde monster stories. All the character names have been pretty European, so maybe I'll use some ye olde Frenche words (since they ALSO just used the Roman god names for planets in more modern French). I used French names/words as the basis for Bird Language words in my other project so I have some experience in doing that. Bilingual bonus easter eggs, I guess?

 

[Chasejxyz]

So I went with mostly the ancient Greek name of the metal that the planet is linked to in alchemy. The only ones that I would expect the majority of people to get would be Ferrus (iron/Mars) and Argent (silver/the moon). Molubdos and Hydragos doesn't really give much hint as to what they are, and they might be able to figure out the others if they see the pattern that's going on here (Sun = Gold = Au, so Aurum). I'm not gonna worry about the planets that aren't visible to the naked eye though I might come up with names for comets or whatnot at some point. Also there's nothing in Real Alchemy for Earth, so I just went off salt (as in a chemical salt, like AbYz, not necessarily NaCl), and I guess I'll also have to use it for "earth" with the 4 classical elements. Researching everything was really enjoyable and it reminded me why I love science so much in the first place.

 

[cak85]

I actually think using a different term for moon or sun could be interesting. For example I read the Prince of Nothing Series a while back. In the story they called the north start, the "Nail of Heaven." At first I was really confused what his characters were talking about but eventually I realized they were referring to some sort of star in the sky. It actually was pretty cool to realize this because it gave me a sense of satisfaction as a reader to know that I could understand a little more of the mystery of the author's world.

 

[MisaMai]

There are loads of really great ideas and interpretations in this thread and I absolutely love it! As many have mentioned before, there is something to be said for having certain things written with common everyday words. There is no need for you to redefine a spoon or find a new word for it. That being said, if a warrior culture in your world uses massive spoons as weapons that is rad and you probably wouldn't want to refer to those as "spoons". My best advice would be to listen to oral histories. There are often stories that are passed down generationally that have concepts that simply can not be described in English. In these cases the orator will often use the native word but because of how the story is told there is no doubt to what that means. Another example of this is people who have grown up fluent in two languages. It is extremely common for students who speak both English and Spanish or English and Mandarin fluently to use words interchangeably between languages when speaking because there simply isn't a word in one of the languages that can describe accurately how they feel in that moment. I suppose another great example of this would be food. There is no English word for Tamale but most English speakers will understand what that word means or, if they don't, it is fairly easy to describe. I don't know if this is much help or if it makes much sense all together but I hope it helps a little bit!