• Diss
  • Rant: Don't Butcher Chinese Names Please

yaoyueyi ngl i read tang huan as 汤换... reminds me of the idiom 换汤不换药. Might just be me with my bad Chinese tho lmao

    icyhail haha I thought it sounded awkward too but it was considerably better than some of the other names they had so... :')

      yaoyueyi do you mind suggesting a name suited for girl that means aloof or something near it?

        6 days later

        yaoyueyi At these times, I'm glad my mother put me through at least a bit of chinese when I was younger....
        lol, huzi. Who did that?

          yaoyueyi Hi, can you help me with my character's name? I'm born Chinese, first language is Chinese, but my language skills are just plain terrible. I don't have much confidence in naming.

          The MCs:
          Yuan Ji
          湲/園
          (Hope)冀

          Yang YueChen
          (To raise/hoist/flutter) 揚
          (Music/cheerful and Earth/Dust) 樂塵

          Other names:
          Zhi He 紙鶴
          Yao Feng
          Gui Zheng 鬼整

          And if you could, please translate this:
          Paper Crane Fleeting Amidst The Storm.

          Many thanks!

            X_I_O not a fan of gui zheng. idk what zhi he is for but that's not a proper name most likely... don't name your kids paper crane lmao
            also you're using traditional chinese here. I only know simplified so can't help you much there.

              NihilisticBeauty well, I don't study last names so I don't know their meanings. I generally know more over first names. all I know about that xu is that it's one of the most common last names, so yep.

              • hiop replied to this.

                yaoyueyi It's a bit late to reply to the thread but what about my MC: Ye Yuyan.

                  16 days later

                  Ahhhhh. Thank you for writing this! Have you seen The Other Side of A Cultivation Novel? 😦 The main character’s name is Shu QAI. And he gets called Qai.... that’s not even a word/character. I left a rant about it on chapter 3 it’s the most upvoted lol.

                    This Tiny Fish brings a question to you, Revered Gramps:
                    Have you any better names than Xiao Lang (Little Wolf) to recommend?
                    Specifically, for a female child whose's a glutton.
                    This Tiny Fish is filled with gratitude (-ω-)ゝ

                      yaoyueyi Please help me YaoYueyi. Do these names sound okay?
                      - Yang Xinyu
                      - Wu Lina (Lina is not a Chinese name. But does it look okay with that last name? Do mixed names exist in Chinese culture?)
                      - Zhang Jia
                      - Yang Ming-Chang
                      - Yang Haobao

                      Please don't laugh! :)

                        MishaK unless your character is an american born chinese or if they have an english name equivalent, then wu lina is okay. otherwise, nah.
                        zhang jia sounds stupid.
                        haobao sounds really really stupid.
                        not the biggest fan of ming chang but oh well. xinyu is the best. nice name.

                          yaoyueyi Did a little research again:

                          How are these names:

                          • Zhang Guan-yin (Zhang being the last name)
                          • Yang Eu-meh
                          • Bo Xilai

                            MishaK guanyin is highkey weird bc that's the name of a buddhist goddess. idk if that's what you're going for but that's just weird.
                            eu meh is not even chinese. I have no idea what language that is... maybe korean??
                            xilai is bearable

                              Xiaoyiyi8 what is this name for...?? modern day no... if you wanted some title for a character in a historical fantasy fic... maybe. but really only historical fantasy is the exception.

                                It's for my male character in my historical fantasy novel. oh, so I can use this! Thanks! 😄

                                  Xiaoyiyi8 don't use it as an actual name then. use it for a title aka position. this would make a terrible actual name. :grimacing:

                                    yaoyueyi I know, I find it's so hard for me to find a decent name for my character 😢 It's hard to solely depend on Google translate

                                      MishaK yeah no. took a brief look and 75% of the names on that site are really really terrible. some aren't even chinese. don't trust it.

                                        yaoyueyi It would be great if someone could suggest an authentic source. I am breaking my head and now pretty confused...

                                          MishaK only authentic source = learn chinese and go on a chinese website with names. honestly. also if you scroll up enough you'll find a post where I posted some chinese names.

                                          yaoyueyi
                                          It's for the actual name of an character, but it would be better if it could ressemble a nickname;
                                          Xiao Lang.
                                          Was this fishy explanation enough?

                                            This is my apology in advance.
                                            My novel has more characters with names that I just think of. I have never taken name meanings into consideration but, am sorry because right now I can't change my plot.
                                            am sorry for using letters to create my own names that sound like Chinese but not.
                                            Forgive me this once. mostly Chinese who use this site.

                                              yaoyueyi If you're not too busy, would you mind looking over a few names I had in mind?

                                              Female: (they're not characters yet, I was stuck between picking a name for my female lead lol)
                                              Bai Lifei
                                              Chen Yueli
                                              Zhao Yueling
                                              Bai Lihua
                                              Li Xueyue

                                              THank you!

                                                So, I tend to disagree here, while logically what the original poster said makes sense, my own naming conventions have actually been rather successful in the few I looked up after the fact. One turned out to be a rather prominent name in Chinese culture: Yu Chang completely by chance as I knew nothing about the Yu Chang blade before naming him. The other is a minor doctor character whose name translated White Snow (honestly very fitting for a doctor since doctors tend to wear white) but it was also random chance.

                                                I know the exception doesn't make the rule, but so far my names have been the exception.

                                                  Xincerely those all sound pretty good!! lifei and xueyue are my personal favorites but they all work <3

                                                    GabrielKross honestly tho when you say white snow or baixue, you're making me think of 白雪公主 (baixue princess) and that's actually snow white the fairytale princess. oh well tho, if that's what you like and are going for. it's not the worst I've ever seen.
                                                    however, I did check out your novel to see exactly what you were talking about, so just a helpful tip: why would you include the accents on only bai xue's name? either do it for yu chang + all the other characters too or remove those accents. they're useless for non-chinese speaking people.
                                                    as for your other character names, they don't sound very good either. ang li sounds like dirty pear (肮梨) (I would highly suggest using 'an li' instead or go for 'li ang' which makes sense because then it makes their last name li and doesn't give the same connotation), ma xiong sounds like horse bear (马熊) or horse brother (马兄)... this one is much worse than ang li actually

                                                    so, "I tend to disagree here". don't think that your "naming conventions" are exactly the most successful. they haven't "been the exception". yu chang is the only decent one imo so good job for that?

                                                      Can you check on these names too? ฅ'ω'ฅ

                                                      Xia Meiren
                                                      Lu Yifeng
                                                      Lu Xian Yu
                                                      Ji Ruo
                                                      Zi Lin
                                                      Mo Jing
                                                      Bai Xui Ying
                                                      Dong Hua
                                                      Gu Mai Ya
                                                      Li Bingbing
                                                      Zhao Long Ji
                                                      Zhang Wei
                                                      Su Lei
                                                      Xia Jiamu
                                                      Xia Sinian
                                                      Jing Yue

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