Choosing character names can be a challenge because names come with so many associations. If you have a friend or a husband called Paul and a character is called Paul, you’ll automatically make connections between the two, however slight, until the character shows himself to be notably different (or the same). It’s the writer’s challenge to make such associations and connections work in the story’s favour.
A name can have limitless associations depending on the reader’s experience, or very specifically limited associations based on shared cultural knowledge. No author is going to name a character Adolf without creating certain expectations. The author’s job, then, is to control a name’s frames of reference as much as possible. There are a few ways to do this.
The simplest method is phonetics. A character called John or Mark (basic, single-syllable names) does not attract much attention. They are almost blank signifiers that will achieve greater meaning as they
