Tuesday 13 September 2011

What's in a name?

So I'm in the process of changing my name. I'm going from Miss Something to Mrs Something-Something (yes, I'm double barrelled now, I could have been triple barrelled if I'd kept my old name too but I decided that would be a bit too much). Anyway, it's weird. And there is a lot to do. I never thought about how many organisations have my details and now they keep popping into my head...tax office, TV license, Sky...do I have to tell everyone? Does it  matter if I forget some?

On a slight tangent...I've realised recently that one of my areas for improvement is finding interesting titles for stories. I'm just not very good at it. I'm always The Something-to-do-with-the-story, which just aint disco, apparently. How do people think of good titles? Titles that are clever but relevant? I think this is the next thing I'm going to really work on and try to improve. Saying that, a brilliant title popped into my head the other day, so I now have a title that I love but no story to go with it. Apparently, this is how Ian Rankin writes, but its all new to me. My title is probably only so fantastic because it isn't attached to anything, like a really amazing photo where the subject has been caught at the only angle they look any good at, and when you see them in real life you think, oh. Was that you? Its a struggle at work too, as I have to give everything headlines and it is really hard - I wish I thought in witty captions, I really do...mind, when you're essentially writing the same stories over and over it is hard to be original. Ah, the dizzy heights of corporate journalism! Speaking of which, I must really get up and get ready to go to the office...bye!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Are you keeping your maiden name for writing? That's a tricky one.

I know what you mean about titles. It might be a good writing group exercise to get people to think up titles for each other and then you have to write about whatever title you're given.

the bijou raconteur said...

Testing testing 1 2 3

the bijou raconteur said...

I've decided I'm going to use my new name for writing from now on. It would be too confusing to have two names on the go!