Living the Fictional Dream

In one of the SED stories that I wrote last week, my main character was the reluctant queen of a kingdom that was getting overrun by civil war. She and her daughter’s life were in danger after the king’s death.

For some reason, when I wrote this story, the queen did not have a name. I just referred to her throughout as “the queen” or by various pronouns. I don’t know why… maybe because it was such a short piece — under 1,000 words. Maybe I just hadn’t had enough time to get to know her yet and learn her name?

Then again, I have read some storie where the main character (sometimes stories where none of the characters have names) and I have enjoyed them. The technique lends a certain amount of mystery to the story. Not having a name is a barrier between the reader and the character, and sometimes that barrier can be put to good use.

But, sometimes I’ve read nameless stories and just been irritated by them. So, as with many writing techniques, it probably depends most heavily on the skill of the writer who created the story and character in the first place. What some writers can pull off, others can’t.

Ultimately, this is a choice that I would not make in too many stories. Overuse of the nameless technique would not be a good thing. Also, I think it’s something better limited to shorter stories. Too much “the queen” would get really old — in an 8,000 word story, no way! (Of course, there is an exception to every rule — I could see writing a longer story about some kind of anti-social character and not using a name because he doesn’t attribute one to himself. It would have to be well done and it would have to be a compelling character detail).

If I got back to this SED story, I think I will give the queen a name and move on from there. She has more of a story to tell, and I think she could be a very personable character given a chance (and a name!). But the idea of writing without one on occasion is intriguing.