Wednesday, April 18, 2012

How many names does one need?

Currently reading and summarizing a research on Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Ya, you know, that super famous guy that overthrown the Chinese monarchy and established the Republic of China. But, do you know how many names he had?! Finding research on him isn't difficult, the difficult part is determining which name I should use for what I'm writing. Let me show you what I've found:


Dr Sun was named Deming 德明 when he was born according to his genealogical position in his family tree, but when he was young he's called Dixiang 帝像 (traditionally, Chinese people have a birth name like 'cow' or 'dog' because it's easier to bring up an animal and hopefully they'll survive). Then he's named Sunwen 孫文 when he got older and once he reached adulthood he was called Zaizhi 載之. His name as a student was Rixin 日新, later became Yixian 逸仙. He also had various nicknames and pseudonyms and one of the famous ones was the name 中山樵 which later became 孫中山, a name commonly used in HK and Taiwan areas.


Ya, seriously, WTH?!

3 comments:

  1. What part of his life are you writing about?

    I would recommend keeping the famous Sun Yat-sen when referring to him throughout, but reference the name he went by at that time.

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    Replies
    1. I'm writing a timeline of sort... but I'm just trying to point out how ridic it is for someone to have so many names.

      I also found out that he had many mistresses and especially fond of girls 10+ years younger than him.

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  2. CRAZY! Also did not know about the (young) mistresses!

    Fi

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