: Re: Characters with no names I've got a few short stories going, and I've foregone naming any of my characters. It started because I just didn't have any good names in my head and I was going

@Shanna875

So just to be clear, you have named them. If you refer to him by it often enough (which may just be one or twice, depending on the context), that is their name. You just haven't giving them a proper name. This an important distinction that points to the fact that it probably doesn't matter. Like anything, it can be hard to pinpoint exactly which elements can turn your readers off, but if your naming scheme is that item, you probably have other problems as well.

It's mostly about how you handle it. If the only recognizable characteristic of "the man in the pink shirt" is the color of this clothing, you have a bigger problem. His name could be Bill Smith or Walla Walla Washington, he still won't grab the reader's attention.

Here are some very memorable characters with no "names":


The Doctor from Doctor Who
The cigarette smoking man from X-files
Everyone in Twelve Angry Men
The Time Traveller from The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
The Man in the Yellow Hat from Curious George
The Second Mrs. de Winter aka the narrator from Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier


And the crown prince:


The Man with No Name from A Fistful of Dollars

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