Stressing a word

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Nonicks

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Hi everybody!

I have a character whose name is Jochai. I stress the O. So it's JOchai and not JochAi. How do I write it in a novel? Should I include an apostrophe ( ' ) and write it this way: Jòchai / Jochái? (how should I use it? I couldn't find it anywhere online) I have one character asking the other how to pronounce the name. :D

Thanks in advance!
 
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be frank

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I mean, yes, you can have the character explain to another character how it's pronounced (a la Hermione in Harry Potter). But ultimately ... why does it matter how your readers say it in their heads? What difference does it actually make?
 
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Maryn

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Lakey

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I don't think adding an accent (not an apostrophe) is going to help you much here. Readers are far more likely to have to guess at how the 'j' or the 'ch' are pronounced than at where the stress is, and there's no diacritic that will solve that problem for you! Short of having the character explain how the name is pronounced, as be frank suggests, there's not much you can do to control how your readers interpret the pronunciation of unfamiliar names.

:e2coffee:
 

Bufty

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+1 to be frank
I mean, yes, you can have the character explain to another character how it's pronounced (a la Hermione in Harry Potter). But ultimately ... why does it matter how your readers say it in their heads? What difference does it actually make?
 

InkFinger

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I'll layer on. It doesn't really matter how a reader says it in their head, but if it does, explain it.
 

Pastelnudes

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Would a hyphen help to keep the stress on the 'O'? Jo-Chai.
 

Ariel.Williams

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I recently read So Done by Paula Chase, which established how to pronounce an MC’s name (Tai) in the first chapter. In narration, she says something like that she knows little about her mom except that they “had the same kinda name—Tay not Tie, she always had to tell people.” What was kinda cool about how she did it was it told us how to pronounce her name and about her relationship with her mom at the same time. That said, I still had to keep correcting my pronunciation as I went.
 

RC turtle

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For those wondering why it could make a difference, remember sometimes nicknames depend on how a name is pronounced. I have a character who is first introduced by her father using her given name, Tamar with the accent on the second syllable. Without some explanation readers might not automatically realize Mari is the same person and wonder for the rest of the book, whatever happened to Tammy?
 

RC turtle

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Also, when I'm reading a book with a character whose name I don't automatically know how to pronounce, every time I stumble over it I get thrown out of the story (and/or feel embarrassed just as if I mispronounced someone's name in real life.) The dracriticals don't help readers who are not familiar with them, either. If Jochai is sometimes called Jo and you make that clear very early, that should work.
 

Nonicks

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Thank you! I just realized this name is super hard to read and remember. In my head, I pronounce it Johai. Is Johai easier than Jochai? Or even Jokai?
 
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Meemossis

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Does anyone else think of that Key and Peele sketch when reading this thread, or is it just me?

A-A-ron.
 

benbenberi

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It doesn't matter how you spell the name, how many hyphens or accents or apostrophes you add to it -- it doesn't even matter if you put an explicit "This is how you should pronounce the name" into the text. It doesn't matter how important it is to you that the name be pronounced this way and not that way. You will NEVER be able to control how readers pronounce the name, any more than you can control any other aspect of how they receive your text.

It's not worth stressing over it. It's not a battle you will ever win, no matter what you do. The inside of a reader's brain is a crowded and complicated place, and you have absolutely no insight into what goes on in there. Once your text hits their eyes, you have handed it over to them to complete the creation, and it's their story now.

Learn to live with it. Focus your anxiety and efforts on the elements of your story you actually do have the power to control.
 

RC turtle

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You may not "win the battle" but that doesn't mean you should ignore anything easily fixed if it keeps readers' heads in the story, right :Huh:
 

Pastelnudes

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Thank you! I just realized this name is super hard to read and remember. In my head, I pronounce it Johai. Is Johai easier than Jochai? Or even Jokai?

For me, Johai is much clearer. I was hearing 'chy' for the second syllable, as in chai tea.

Mmm, I love tea :)
 

mccardey

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For those wondering why it could make a difference, remember sometimes nicknames depend on how a name is pronounced. I have a character who is first introduced by her father using her given name, Tamar with the accent on the second syllable. Without some explanation readers might not automatically realize Mari is the same person and wonder for the rest of the book, whatever happened to Tammy?

Also, when I'm reading a book with a character whose name I don't automatically know how to pronounce, every time I stumble over it I get thrown out of the story (and/or feel embarrassed just as if I mispronounced someone's name in real life.) The dracriticals don't help readers who are not familiar with them, either. If Jochai is sometimes called Jo and you make that clear very early, that should work.

You may not "win the battle" but that doesn't mean you should ignore anything easily fixed if it keeps readers' heads in the story, right :Huh:

I'm with the turtle on this, and I'm wondering if it might not be simpler to just change the name. The issue with many made-up names is that they often carry no meaning except to the writer - if that's the case with this one, I'd be changing it to something less problematic.
 

Lakey

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I don't think you have to change the name, if you're willing to let go of the notion that readers must hear it in their heads a certain way. For what it's worth, it reminded me of the Hebrew name Yochai, and so that's how I heard it in my head (indeed, there are probably some languages in which that name gets transcribed as Jochai). That's why I said you'd have more variation among readers as to how to interpret the consonants (j or y? h or ch or tch?) than with the stress. But, again, give them some guidance if you want to, decide it's not the end of the world if some readers don't remember it, and write your story. It's a fine name.

:e2coffee:
 

mccardey

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For what it's worth, it reminded me of the Hebrew name Yochai, and so that's how I heard it in my head (indeed, there are probably some languages in which that name gets transcribed as Jochai).
Same. I assumed Hebrew connections to the character's world, however tangential, and wondered if that was significant. But then when discussion of punctuation etc came in, it threw me out of that assumption and out of my expected pronunciation. So the name is probably making me do more work than the writer intended.
 
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frimble3

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Unless you're doing an audio-book, or the pronunciation is the subject of some clever, clue-giving word-play, does it really matter?
I can think of several ways to pronounce Jochai, but I'm reading the story in my head, I will drift into one, and that'll be that.
When reading silently, it's the shape of the word that matters, I find.
As long as it's pronounceable, not a mass of consonants with random punctuation, I'm good.
 
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Nonicks

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It IS the Hebrew name Yochai! But it seems like no English readers will ever get it correctly.
 

Bufty

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It IS the Hebrew name Yochai! But it seems like no English readers will ever get it correctly.

I've never heard of the name but Yochai is how I saw it and heard it in my mind. Similar to the "Och aye" often heard in Scotland. In story terms, does it matter to me -as the reader- how I read it or hear it?
 

AW Admin

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Just use the actual name as it is usually written in English; Yochai isn't all that rare.

When you make up a new spelling in English without knowing what you're doing, you make it worse.

Accent marks like ó or á in English ONLY occur in loan words, words we've stolen from other languages.

And the orthography of those words follows the rules of those other languages phonology, not English. You're just confusing the issue and the reader.

Use Yochai.
 
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