Fandom Discussion: Misspelling Proper Names

[themostepotente]

Okay, folks...

Is it so much to ask to reference the correct spellings of proper names from either the books or the Lexicon?

In the past month, I have ran across THREE fics where a character's name was spelled incorrectly. Now, I know that we are all human and make mistakes, but a typo that's skirted past weary eyes is something all together entirely different from misspelling oh say, G-R-I-F-E-N-D-O-R. *cues her audience to cringe*

The first fic I encountered was a Lucius/Draco with a brief mention of Walden Macnair. Macnair was spelled M-C-N-A-I-R. Apparently the 'a' went AWOL. And funny, nobody that reviewed the fic caught this.

Oh-kay, moving right the fuck along, the next fic I encountered was a Snape/Bellatrix. Now all of you Rodolphus Lestrange fans are going to be plucking your eyeballs out over this. Rodolphus's name was spelled not once, not twice, but THREE different ways -- in ONE fic. Rudolphus, Rodulphus, and Rodolphus.

I have issues with the word 'cinnamon.' I am forever looking this bitch up. For some odd reason, I can never remember how to spell it. Two 'n's? Two 'm's? But to spell it both ways and think, well, one way must be right...is just trifling. So I use my handy dandy online dictionary. It's just that simple.

The last fic I ran across was by far the WORST. How the fuck do you misspell Severus? No shit, I found a fic where he was referred to as Saverus. Saverus? What the FUCK is that? Doesn't that have a bit of a Vulcanesque ring to it? I'm reading this story for shits and giggles and picturing Snape with pointy ears and arched eyebrows.

Pon Farr? Live Long and Prosper? *headdesk*

Any stories you'd care to share? Leave 'em here!

--Penny

Comments

[ceilidh]

Rudolphus the red nosed Death Eater...

*giggles*

[scarah2.livejournal.com]

I consider myself to be not too appalling in this area, but only about a week ago someone sporked me for saying MacNair, which I'd been doing ALL THIS TIME.



*hides*

[cleverthylacine]

The character depicted in my icon is named Lucius.

Not Lucious.

And don't shoot back at me that it's because he is, because the word you think you're using there is 'luscious', with another 's'.

Thank you.

And Saverus? Rihannsu.

[ladysorka]

Save'r'us . Discount potions for all occasions!

[underlucius.livejournal.com]

How I wish I could do this anon. I hope that the person I just beta-ed for doesn't read this....

I sometimes offer to beta for complete strangers who show promise, because, after all, someone took pity on me once and took a chance. But recently I really regretted it. Here are just SOME of the gems in this fic that had my buttocks clenching and me stuffing a hankie in my mouth to stop myself screaming with laughter. The comments in brackets are mine)

"Harry had a tick up his sleeve" (Ouch!)
"Dark arrived and we set out in Buckbeak" (Vrooom!!!)
"your lips tickled the back of my neck with their gentile caresses" ( Oy Vey!)
"I felt myself becoming swiftly more aroused by your tender administrations. " (Cant be the Bush administrations?)

"Kisses were trialed in offering down your front" ( well, got to try them out...)

"nipping at my nipples" (and presumably fingering my fingers and cocking my cock)

"biting softly on my lower lip as you used your hand to start the chain reaction to the top" (? is his top lip about to come?)

"but only you and Buckbeak, hunting for lizards, herd me" (Get along there! Yah!)

"The setting was dismal. " (tell me about it)

"In one hand toy held a box, which you opened before me, a silver band glinted in the firelight. I raised my head to look into your eyes, and I could barely contain my mounting joy. You voice, when you spoke, sounded miles away.

"Remus, will you marry me?" (BLEUGHK!!!!!!!)

"How I had wanted to hear that from your deep vocals" (How I want to die)

On a personal note. I can't spell McGonnagall. See?

[a_belladonna]

I've seen "Lucious", "Imperious", "Wizongamot"/"Wizongamut". It's the ones I remember right now :)

[tytoalba.livejournal.com]

I'd just like to know who the fuck Maggie Magonaggle is

[gmth.livejournal.com]

My fave is the Crustaceous curse (http://www.livejournal.com/users/mctabby/274121.html). That had me giggling for days.

[rillathegrape.livejournal.com]

Misspelled names are the big thing that turn me off on a fic. No offense to the authors who misspell them, and I'm sure some of them have wonderful stories with great plotlines, I just can't continue reading. It's too much work for my poor addled brain, I think, to keep correcting as I go along.

And OMG, cinnamon does that to me too! And "occasionally" (which I just had to look up to use here). Gah, that one kills me and yet I use it all the time. But yeah, like you said... dictionary, spell check, viola!

[maeglinyedi.livejournal.com]

My biggest pet peeve when it comes to names is the constant misspelling of Macnair. It's like 90% of fandom doesn't know how to spell that name. Unlike with some other names, this isn't just your average badfic writer fucking up. This is good, respected writers misspelling it.

I swear, if I'd gotten a dollar for every time I've seen Macnair misspelled, I'd be a very rich woman right now.

(And yes, I do usually point it out to the author, but it doesn't seem to make a difference on a whole.)

*sighs*

[maelwaedd.livejournal.com]

So there's this fic, called Muggle Clothing. Written by some newbie called Magdellin. Somehow she managed to type 'Griffindor' fifteen times, misspell a few other names, and even typo'd 'Giny' once.

Good thing she never finished it. :)

[maubast.livejournal.com]

Some rec'ed a story to me the other day - can't remember what it was, it was Snarry. Something about going to "Los Vegas". Los? I immediately hit the back button.

In due South fandom, I used to see Frasier (instead of Fraser), Welch instead of Welsh, etc. etc.

We all have issues with a word or two (well, most of us do anyway!). The dictionary is your friend. So is a friend who has the balls to tell you, "Hey, you really need to check your spellings."

I've been accused a time or twenty of being a fic snob. Fine, if the fact that I want things spelled correctly, I'm a snob. I'm not talking about the infamous teh and things like that - I'm talking Hary Poter type misspellings. :)

[lunulet.livejournal.com]

PUT DOWN THE FF.N AND BACK AWAY SLOWLY.


also, your icon slays me! HAHAHah

[shakespearechic.livejournal.com]

Seamus FinnEgan. The name can be spelled both ways, but JKR spells it as FinnIgan in canon so that's just one I've looked up before to make sure and it irks me. Finnigan, Finnigan, Finnigan.

[lunulet.livejournal.com]

Oh, and also, am I the only one who can't spell Aveda kedavra .. avada kedavara.. um... avada..

Aveda = line of fine cosmetics
Avada = killing curse.

okey.

Here via the Snitch or some sort

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Urg, I hate name misspellings, especially if they're consistent throughout the fic. Once that your spellcheck and beta overlook, okay, forgivable. But if you're writing a fic about this character, shouldn't you care enough to find out how to spell their name?

Back in my Vampire Chronicles days there was this one author who had the worst spelling ever, combined with a tendency to run spellcheck and accept every correction without bothering to see if it corrected it correctly... Half her fics featured a character named Lester, which is apparently what MS Word thought Lestat should be... I'm sorry, but the Vampire Lester just does not have the same ring to it!

Sort of related, I recently created a sock puppet journal and deliberately misspelled things in the interests... "albus dumbledor" is an interest of one comm and 7 users, all of which are RPG characters. "ewan macgregor" (instead of McGregor) is an interest for 6 comms and 468 users!!! How can you be a fan of someone and not even know how to spell their name!? *weeps*

Here via QQ

[acony-bell.livejournal.com]

Voldermort.
Blaise Zambini.

*screams*

Now, to rat out myself, I always misspell 'necessary'.

[instrumentality.livejournal.com]

I would have to agree on Zambini. Everytime someone includes Blaise Zambini in a fic, I picture this androgynous Slytherin appearing on a hockey rink between periods to clean up the ice. I dunno. Maybe it's just me.

[chasethecat.livejournal.com]

Weasly. *shudders*

[chrysantza.livejournal.com]

Here via Quickquote:

In its pull-down menus where one can select fics according to character, ff.net used to allow readers to select fics featuring "Sirus B." I guess the powers-that-be at ff.net forgot to buy a vowel, though I do believe it's fixed now.

Other pet hates: "Lilly," "Pansey," (jeez, you don't even need the Lexicon for these, just a garden book!), "Weasely," and the thousands of ways one can butcher McGonagall - "McGonigal," "MacGonnigle," etc. And "Voldermort." I see this latter so often and wonder why the universal urge to insert the extra "r?"

[yamheads.livejournal.com]

Saverus?

Sounds like some sort of skin cream.

[janegraddell.livejournal.com]

Here via quickquote

I can understand that a novice fan of a television show might not know how to spell a name at first (in fact, it was a few episodes, as I recall, before Alex Krycek's name got any canonical spelling), but there's a limited amount of slack for that kind of thing. But if you're going to take the time to write a story, or even just hang out in the fandom, then for crying out loud do some elementary research! And if you're in a book-based fandom? No excuse.

Then, of course, there's the one author I recall who announced in her story notes that she was going to spell Blaise Zabini's name "Zambini" because she liked it better. No words.

I'm also reminded of the poster on the main Highlander mailing list whose mission was to see that Richie "No T" Ryan's name was spelled correctly. Mind you, this was something that even the show's official website didn't always get right....

[abremaline.livejournal.com]

Saverus? Sounds like 'Save us!' "Save us, Sev'rus save us." Err...yeah, I'll stop there.

The misspelling of 'Draco' tends to annoy me. It's five letters! Not entirely an uncommon name/word either. It is beyond me how people get that one wrong.

*hugs tightly everyone who said they had to check the spelling of 'McGonagall'* I'm another one for that. Each and every time I have to look that one up, just to make I got it right.

Still waiting to see 'Harry' spelt wrong. (You just know its going to happen eventually.)

[biggersandwich.livejournal.com]

That bugs me too. I especially can't understand it in Harry Potter Fandom where a LOT of the characters have relatively normal, English names (or at least compared to my anime fandoms where there isn't necessarily an English spelling for the name). The spell check might not catch everything but you shouldn't be able to write Hary or something like that.

[ahriman-lives.livejournal.com]

You think you've seen horror?

Sirius as 'Serious'.

I deserve compensation.