Everyone will pronounce it wrong 'Ophelia'

[pinksodabubbles]

Hi all,

So I'm due in 2 weeks and want to name my daughter Ophelia. I'm from England and speak fluent Spanish, having studied it and lived there for a year.

The Spanish pronounciation is Oh-fell-ee-ah, which is what I want but I don't like the Spanish spelling (Ofelia, like in El Labarinto del fauno). Everywhere else seems to pronounce it Oh-feel-ya which I don't want.

Is there a way to get everyone to pronounce her name the way I like it (Spanish style) without changing to the Spanish spelling? (I have synaesthesia and mild autism if that helps explain why I'm picky on the spelling and the colours of the spelling put me off).

Would 'Ophélia' be better? With the accent on the e to show emphasis?

I think you’re just setting yourself up for a lifetime of correcting pronunciation. I doubt the accent will make much difference. Lovely name though.

You can’t spell it one way and expect if to be pronounced another.

Nope. If you care about the pronunciation I wouldn't choose that name. People will slaughter that one and you'll mostly get Oh-feel-ya.

But the accent doesn’t show emphasis, does it? It changes how that vowel is pronounced and it’s not pronounced like fell.

Are you sure people always pronounce it wrong?

I knew straight away how it should be pronounced, and it's a beautiful name.

Nope. Everyone will get it “wrong”.

It’s a name with horrid associations anyway, op. I would choose something else.

No, sorry
Ophelia will be pronounced O fee lia
Ofelia will also be pronounces O fee lia by a lot of people.
Why did you write El labarinto del fauno instead of pan's labyrinth? You know you're posting on an English website right?

No way will people in the UK pronounce it how you want, and as a pp says the associations aren't great.

wheresmyvagina shock horror, the OP chose to use the original name of the film rather than the English translation of it, let’s kick her off this “English website”
Ophelia is a beautiful name OP and I would pronounce it like you would, but I can see a lot people using the other pronunciation I’m afraid

It was a pretentious and weird thing to do.

I doubt you’ll ever get an e for egg rather than ee sound if that’s what you want. It’s just too unusual in English.

Eeek! Seems like it's not going to be a good idea. Thanks for the input guys.

I know about the Hamlet asociations but a lot of Shakespeare women were quite mad lol so I'm not too fussed about that. Thanks for the heads up though, I realise it was incase I wasn't aware x

Re: Why I wrote El Labarinto, I just forgot that they changed the name to an English version, sorry.

Cheers all x

I liked this name...dh knew one at school..nickname was peodophilia. Just a heads up.

If you put an é I think you'll get the French pronunciation O- fey- lia. Nicer than the anglicised version but not what you want.
It's a shame as you love it - you might control it as a baby but it's harder once they get to school and onwards

I don't think putting the accent on the 'e' will help much as many people will think it's an acute accent (à la Français) rather than a stress accent in the Spanish manner. And é tends to be pronounced as 'ay' (long 'a') as in répondre so you'd have people saying o-phay-lia not o-fell-ia.

AFAIK the correct pronunciation in English is as you describe the Spanish pronounciation. It’s certainly how I’d pronounce it.
You can’t do anything about lazy pronounciation, so if you think that’s what will happen, choose a different name.

Oops misread your phonetics. Amended advice: if you don’t like the English pronounciation, choose a different name.

Huh? Correct or not it's mostly pronounced the same as Delia.

I've certainly never heard RSC actresses saying "i'm playing Ofellia at the Old Vic."

Dammit. Crosspost queen strikes again ☺️

I thought it was an acute accent, in the french way. I didn’t know Spanish has accents for stress.

So you are English, you live in England except for the year you lived in Spain but you didn't know that in England the massively popular film pans labyrinth was called pans labyrinth in the uk so you wrote the obviously lesser known Spanish title and didn't think people would be confused?

For what it's worth where I live the name would be pronounced o fee Lia or (although they sound the same) o fee leea

I love this name and it’s on my girls list, I knew one too NN Phi-Phi.

I know two cousins both called Leila.
One pronounced Layla, the other Lee-la

Tbh I don’t see how this is much different? Pronounce her name and spell it however you want!

Who on earth pronounces it Oh-feel-ya

I agree with Where its O fee lia or as Tartyflette says to rhyme with Delia

More Oh-feel-ee-ah rather than Oh-fell-ee-ah

I’ve only ever encountered is as oh-feel-ee-ah. thats the way i would say it. your DD is going to be correcting people her whole life! either a) find another name you like as much, b) call her Ophelia but pronounced oh FEEL ia, c) call her Ophelia pronounced oh FELL ia as you wanted and sentence her to a life of “no its said this way”. any way you go, good luck!! xx

I just always want to say Ophelia butt. It's such a burlesque ready name