Creating the Positively Perfect Title For Your Writing

by Lindsay Price

Titles are important and it's careless to think otherwise. The title is the doorway into whatever world you've spent time and effort to create. If you or your writing are not a known quantity, an audience will decide whether or not to pick up your novel based on the title. An audience will decide whether or not to see your play or movie based on the title. Titles can draw an audience in or turn them quickly away. Titles can make you a lot of money, or a little. That's a lot of pressure to place on a few words that took considerable less time to write than the work itself!

The art of the title is tricky. It's a tightrope. Titles have to convey something about the particular work. Titles have to entice an audience and make them want to know more. Titles have to be interesting, specific and efficient. But if they're too specific and too clever that can confuse an audience. A good title will put you on the right path toward finding an audience for your writing. How do you create the perfect title for your writing?

First or Last?

There are just as many how-to lists that will urge you to come up with the title at the start of the writing process as there are for you to wait till the very end. The truth is 'when' doesn't matter. If you come up with something right away, that's great. Write it down and once you've finished the particular project, use the title test below to see if it's still suitable. If nothing comes to mind right away, do not worry. Focus on the task at hand and when you're done writing, then worry about the title.

The Most Important Words.

The best starting point for any title is the work itself. Go through your writing and highlight individual significant words. Words that mean something to the story, to the characters, to the theme. Individual words are better than going after sentences or paragraphs: you're always looking to write a leanefficient title. Write out the words in a point form list. Are there any that go together? Any synonyms that might work? Is there alliteration? What is the most important word?

The Most Important Images.

After you search through the text for the most important words, write a list of images that come to mind when you read your work. Images are a powerful tool for titles: aim to create an image in the minds of the audience. If the audience can 'see' your work through an image in the title, it creates a connection between them and you. What are the most important images in your writing? What pictures come to mind?

Quotes Can Be Key.

Still stuck? Start looking up quotes inspired by the themes in your work. Famous quotes, inspirational quotes, quotes from literature. Lines of poetry are useful because more often than not they're written as images. Shakespeare is also another imagistic writer. What famous Shakespeare quotes can be connected to the theme of your work?

The Title Test.

You have a couple of titles you're kicking around but you're not sure which to go with. Give the titles to your family, friends, fellow writers,colleagues , anyone and everyone, and have them answer the questions below. It would be better if these outside eyes haven't read the work before hand; you just want to know the impact of the title.

• Based on the title, what's this (novel, short story, play, movie) about?
• Who is the main character?
• What's the first image that pops into your mind?
• What's the first emotion that pops into your mind?
• What question does the title make you ask?
• Do you want to know more about this work? On a scale of 1-10 how badly do you want to know more?

You'll want to give the title test to at least five people. This way you can see which questions garner similar answers, and which widely vary. And if every person talking the test would not want to know more, strongly consider changing that title!

Lindsay Price is the resident playwright for Theatrefolk, an independent publisher of playscripts for schools and student performers. http://www.theatrefolk.com/blog