Unlike tragic dramatists, who have usually inherited their characters' names from history or myth, comic writers are name-givers. They have always confronted a fundamental choice: whether to give speaking names, expressing the nature of the characters, or accidental ones, which allow for greater independence and for change. These different attitudes towards naming are bound up with the larger debate about the truthful or arbitrary nature of language itself: the debate formalized in Plato's dialogue Cratylus, and continuing today.