Quote:
Originally Posted by Quoth
No.
The only solution is a better choice of names that don't sound the same, but are commonly female and male versions of the same name. It's a lazy or thoughtless choice.
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I agree with the first part of your statement. But I'm not quite certain why you think the traditional genders of the names have anything to do with the confusion in my scenario. It's completely irrelevant in my mind. Group dialogue would be just as confusing if two male characters (or two female characters) were named Jayne/Jane. I trip over who is being spoken to/about because the names sound identical. Period. Gender doesn't enter into it. The narrator changes their tone enough to easily identify when one of the Ja(y)nes are
doing the talking.
It's "Bob looked warily at <name>" that's the problem when spoken. Spoken by anyone.