Project Other Names: A Collection of Fictional Characters

An exercise to explore the different vibes of names used in a story and their relationship with the plot. Captured in a fleeting undefined moment.


Here's also a random picture in case you reached here by accident and find the contents of the page a tad too silly for your time.

The task of assigning names to characters in stories has always been a bit confusing for me. Either they are too eccentric or misplaced, misdirected or just feel like a mouthful. With this exercise I hope I get more comfortable with naming. Okay. Amuse yourself.

#1

“Mutuality isn’t the least bit important in marriage, Ajay. It counts only in romance.”

Ajay gave his pretty paramour a long look. Did she believe this stuff? Or was she playing some deep female game? He knew he would not marry her. He was proud of her, and he enjoyed her company, but she wasn’t what he had in mind for a lifetime partner.

#2

Ankita was all As, in the eleventh grade, an active member of a number of academic clubs and excused from sports for obvious reasons.

Once every two weeks, Ankita met her physician who emptied her pockets of stones and insisted she urinate before stepping on the weighing scale. She had been hospitalised only once in her life, yet her mother was convinced Ankita was never more than a few milligrams away from an emergency hospital visit.

Ankita showed the usual signs of disease. Hair loss. Skin stretched like a thin white membrane over the sharp bones on her face. Her voice as harsh as a saw. But her conversations, unless the subject was her own body mass, was reasonable and intelligent.