>>In Soviet SF they used to parade a lot of Anglophone persons, and rarely got their names to sound right. I remember one "Rai Rup" - supposedly a rich American. Ever heard of anyone called Rye Roop? Me neither. But let's see it the other way around. How do the Anglophones imagine foreign names. The days of Soviet isolationism are gone, the Web has covered the Earth, we're supposed to move freely and can access anything in a nanojiffy, right? Not always so - sometimes, nothing beats laziness.
last refreshed 04/01/2010 12:37:22 PM
| Imaginary | Known in Serbian as | |
|---|---|---|
| Chekov | Čehov | Chekhov, assuming that "k" in "kh" means "pronounce the bloody aitch" |
| Evanovich | Ivanovič, Ivanović | This attempt in phonetic spelling comes from a language which always puts history above phonetics. There was never an Evan among Slavic names. Ivan, yes. |
| Ivonova | Ivanova | at least they got the gender right... and this was not in the credits, just the viewer's reviews, but more than once. In the piece itself, the role is named properly. |
| Kalingrad | Kalinjingrad | Kaliningrad (two ins, hear that?) |
| Kawalski | Kowalski | |
| Papadopolis | Papadopoulos | Of top ten Greek last names, all end with -poulos. -polis is a fitting suffix for an ancient Greek city, not a person living nowadays. |
| Sergeivich | Sergejevič | The extra e exists, no matter how you go around it, mr. Vinge. It's a whole syllable. Try Sergeyevich. |
| Shandar | Sándor | Yes, Hungarian s reads as sh, but that's no reason to go phonetic just like that. No favors, no exceptions. |
| Souvarov | Suvorov | |
| Vaselov | Vasiljev | Vasilev |
| Vasic as an Albanian last name | Vasić is a mostly Serbian name; any derived Albanian last names would be spelt with -iqi instead of -ić | Find a real Albanian name. |
| Victor Drazen, as a name of a Serbian character in a video game | Unknown. Viktor maybe, although that's rare; Dražen (with a ž, and not to be pronounced as drayzen) is not a last name; it's a first, and it's predominantly Croatian. | Find a name. |