BootsnAll Travel Community

I've started writing some articles, which is a foreign concept to me (I'm a regular blogger). I'm wondering - what is the protocol for referring to someone who appears over and over in a particular story (deserving of an actual name rather than just "that dude")? Refer to them by their real name? Change the name? Something else altogether?

This person is not the subject of the story, but a major player, nonetheless. Because I'm new to all of this, I don't feel comfortable telling this guy that he's *part* of my story, but at the same time, I don't want feel comfortable mentioning his name when I haven't received his direct permission to do so.

Actually... now that I've written this out, I feel that the most appropriate thing to do is to use a different name. However, I'd still appreciate any feedback that others have had with this.

I say change the name. You can always tell the person later, "Hey, I've been writing these articles, and guess what? You're Steve." (Or whatever fake name you use). If the stories don't make that person look bad, he/she will probably get a kick out of it. If not, you don't have to tell him/her. And maybe changing the name will give you a bit of plausible deniability of he/she stumbles onto your articles and is pissed

Well, I haven't done it myself, but I've seen this done:

The gangly gentleman sitting next to me, who I'll call Steve,...

So it's clear that you are making up a name, which I think is reasonable in this context. Not only can you feel you are being straightforward about making up a name, but it is realistic to other travellers reading who realize that you aren't going to know the names of every person you interact with (but who also appreciate that you've given him a name to facilitate the telling of the story).

Common problem.

In one story I referred to a girlfriend as "The designated companion". A columnist who I used to follow referred to his kids as "the muppets" (pre "Muppets" by the way). Phyllis Dillar referred to her husband as "Fang". I think that Calvin Trillan referred to his wife as "The Blonde".

Just do not use their real name.

yeah, change the names.

Spalding Gray used to meditate for hours until the perfect pseudonym presented itself to him. I pull mine from a paperback book titled "What To Name Your Baby".

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I pull mine from a paperback book titled "What To Name Your Baby".

I grab names from my spam folder, e-mail sender list.

CalvinTrillan's wife was also endearingly called "La Princapessa".

Here's another name for you, NTFT, from my today's spam folder, Jathbiyya Phifer. She was enquiring about my lack of, or bad err-ection.

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I grab names from my spam folder, e-mail sender list.

That is brilliant. Finally a good use for spam.

Thanks for the tips.

As a side note, I won't be putting this person in a negative light in any way. I simply felt like I should change his name since I don't have plans to tell him I'm writing an article.

Speaking of writing negatively about people... Does anyone have any interesting stories about writing something negative about someone? There's a recurring character in my life that keeps coming up in my blog posts, which I eventually plan to use as the basis for other writing. In any case, this person would definitely not come out in a good light. This, of course, would ruin the friendship that he believes we have (I cannot stand him). All that being said, it is simply not in my nature to make someone look poorly for a story. I'm wondering what stories other people have about this.

I don't think Kerouac ever once referred to any of his friends or peers by their real names:

Jack Kerouac Characters: Real names and their aliases


If one of the reasons you're thinking of using an alias is that you don't want the pressure of having to produce a published piece after asking your friend, then consider just writing the story with a false name, shopping it around, and then deciding whether you want to ask him or not. Depending on where it's being published you may have time or opportunity to swap the real name in.

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Originally posted by Not the first Travis:

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I pull mine from a paperback book titled "What To Name Your Baby".

I grab names from my spam folder, e-mail sender list.

Upon landing in Perth we checked into a local backpacker and it just so happened HotBlonde4uHome2Nite was there as well. After her and Viagra4Cheap's incident in Melbourne I wasn't sure how things would turn out but after having a few beers with AsSeenonTv@cox.net and being ....

I like the idea of using a different name, but remain consistant with the name through out the different writings.

Though I am guilty of just using the person's real name.

I watched the Movie "Capote" this week and have been thinking about it since. In the moview Truman Capote becomes close and also lies and also hopes for the death of the person he is writing about. It is an interesting think to ponder over when writing about real people.

Truman Capote also lost all of his friends when toward the end of his life, he wrote a novel in which they all appeared, thinly veiled, as back-bitin' social nightmares!

If it's not in a negative light, I would use their first name. They'll probably get a kick out of it.

It completely depends on who you're writing for. You say you're doing articles. If you're doing them for a newspaper or magazine, if you're not writing fiction and if you don't have a good reason to change their name, you shouldn't change it.

If you do change the name and you don't change it to something immediately identifiable as a nickname, (i.e. Bong Boy) you need to mention this upon first reference.

If you're writing for a journalistic publication and you change the name without mentioning it or telling your editors, you're going to write yourself out of a job.

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(i.e. Bong Boy

There goes skobb's cover...