Hello,

In UNIMARC, you could distinguish the firstname and the famillyname :

see http://www.ifla.org/VI/3/p1996-1/uni7.htm#700
700 #1$aOrwell,$bGeorge

in MODS, i think it's like in MARC21, you always write NAME like this :
"surname, firstname"

<name type="personal">
 <namePart>Alterman, Eric.</namePart>
</name>

it should be fine to have something like this (example taken from DocBook):

<name type="personal">
 <firstname>George</firstname>
 <surname>Orwell</surname>
</name>

<name type="personal">
 <firstname>Yves</firstname>
 <surname>Pratter</surname>
        <email>[log in to unmask]</email>
</name>

Thank you.

Yves