(no subject)

[pearwaldorf]

85% of the amusement of a Good Omens Untamed AU for me is awful bilingual puns and dumb fandom jokes that are comprehensible to about ten people in the world and funny to only two.

 

So here is a thought exercise/stab at shoehorning the ineffable idiots into an Untamed setting. Probably the easiest place is to start with names. We can do this phonetically or literally. If you’re lucky, you can make it work both ways, but that’s not always possible.

 

(Please note I am not fluent in Chinese/Mandarin at all, because colonialism and lack of practice. I have just enough facility to bumble around dictionaries and hope it sounds right. 

 

For ease I have used simplified Chinese characters, because people who can read traditional characters can usually puzzle them out but not vice versa. All romanized pronounciations are in pinyin.)

 

With Crowley, I would go for a literal-ish approach, because there’s no “cr” sound in Mandarin. But there are, of course, words for crow 乌 (wū) and raven 乌鸦 (wū yā). No actual parent would literally name their kid after a bird, but since it’s a name he picked himself, why not.

 

“Lǐ” is an incredibly common Chinese surname, so no issues there. I just picked 李 because it’s the variant that Li Po/Li Bai uses. So, 李乌(鸦). 

 

(No I do not know what factors influence the different variations in characters. Geography certainly, but probably other stuff.)

 

Aziraphale is kind of a special case. His given name would be 訾娆 (Zī ráo), Zī being his surname and ráo meaning “graceful”. (I’m sure there’s a phonetic equivalent that means steadfast or martial or wev, but I couldn’t find it. Also this is a thought exercise.)

 

If you’ve watched Chinese language anything, you know “Ah”/阿 is used to denote familiarity. In The Untamed, Yanli calls her brothers “Ah Cheng” and “Ah Xian”. Mostly it’s used as a sign of affection and closeness, but it can also be used as a form of mockery and disrespect. (cf “ah sir” in Hong Kong, especially now.)

 

It is almost a certainty Crowley would call Aziraphale something like 阿訾(娆) or 阿娆. It would be meant in affection for sure, but also it would be rude af, and drive Aziraphale absolutely batshit.

Comments

[potofsoup]

aaaa I love giving people Chinese names! I think 鸦 is the more Crow part of 乌鸦 tho? Like, the Wu part is just the black part... You can also go with the Crawly origin, perhaps? Some sort of 爬 or 攀? 李乌 is a much more nice-sounding name tho

[pearwaldorf]

It literally did not occur to me to think about snakey names until you mentioned it. I think 小龙 would be fucking adorable, but it doesn't strike me as the sort of name Crowley would pick for himself. 虺 is a bit grandiose, but maybe.

Also I read the cutest fic that touches on Crowley in ancient China and the zodiac.