I found the name Izaya.(Thats how it was spelled) It is actually pronounced EE-ZI-YA but I am afraid people would say [name]Isaiah[/name]. The name is Japanese and if I put a h at the end its Hebrew and pronunced [name]Isaiah[/name]. Should I spell it more phonetically or should I not mess with the original spelling? Alternative spellings I found would be Ezaya, Iziya, Eziya. Thanks for the help!
I would pronounce this as [ih-ZEYE-ah], like [name]Izzy[/name] plus [name]Maya[/name]. Um, let me be clearer - “ih” as in [name]Isabel[/name], “zeye” as in zydeco, and “ah” as in [name]Laura[/name]. I would never pronounce it with an EE start, but I just find that a little awkward in general. For example, my favorite name is [name]Eliza[/name], but I don’t say it as [EE-lie-zah]. It feels too choppy, if that makes any sense…
[name]Lemon[/name]
Thanks, Thats what I was trying to write it as. So Izaya is pronunced (ih- ZEYE-ah). Great example: [name]Izzy[/name] + [name]Maya[/name]
I think the Iziya spelling would bE more likely to get the right pronounciation.
I take it you’re a Durarara fan, right?
Luckily Japanese is a fairly phonetic language and is pretty easy to pronounce in English. Therefor I doubt you’d have much trouble with people mispronouncing Izaya. That said Izaya is really not a “Japanese” name so to speak. It’s meant to be [name]Isaiah[/name] only written in a way that’s more intuitive to pronounce for someone who doesn’t natively speak English. In short I suppose you could say it’s the Japanese form of [name]Isaiah[/name], though it would still be an odd name in Japan which is mentioned in some of the books.
So in short I suppose I’m trying to say I’m not sure if I would recommend it’s use as a name-especially in the English speaking world where it would just look misspelled.