The Power in a Name

I know I’ve touched briefly on the subject of names before, but there is an opportunity with this topic to delve into a deeper significance. I’m talking specifically about character names here, as with Matt’s and my protagonists, we ponder long and hard about the names we choose or create.

The significance of a name is nothing new. Look back to your favorite fairy tales, and you’ll find it’s a recurring theme that a being’s name invokes power. Rumplestiltskin is a great example, where the queen must guess his name in order to keep her child. Roughly translated, “Rumplestiltskin” is a German goblin that rattles the posts (stilts) in a house’s foundation. In other tales of folklore and myth, to know the name of a demon, spirit, or creature is to have the power to banish it or command it.

Modern authors have also employed the value in a name. In The Neverending Story, Bastion must name the Childlike Empress in order to save the world of Fantastica. Josepha Sherman’s The Horse of Flame has a wind-spirit that is imprisoned by the name given it: Sv’istat. The spirit is only freed when the letters of its name are erased one by one in a spell. The Last Unicorn, Peter S. Beagle’s classic, the unicorn is given a name when she becomes human. This is significant because she is the only unicorn to ever taste mortality, to ever have a name.

Names define us, and we use them to define everything around us. The scientific names of plants and animals are descriptive of a particular species. Our first, middle, and last names speak to our heritage, our culture. Look in any baby name book, and you’ll see that the origin of every name has a special meaning. “Stephanie” is Greek for “crown.”

Matt and I have pored over baby name books to find just the right name for our characters. The meaning of the name must be significant, and the overall feeling of the word must match the character’s personality. We try to match names and their origins to particular cultures in our books. For instance, we try to name all our Markanturians from Old English. (Ok, Arcturus is an exception, but he is exceptional among his own kind).

Our latest struggle has been dealing with a nameless character. He is a struggle to work with because he is known by so many names, yet none are his own. He never chooses a name to define himself, and that is an important detail we maintain. He is a wanderer, and he does not seem to belong anywhere. His identity is a mystery, because it changes from book to book, from place to place he visits. He is different in the eyes of every character who interacts with him, and his assortment of names reflects this.

We have yet another character, who among his people—the Ilangiel—was born Eraekryst. As he integrates himself amongst Humans, he is given the name Erik. But the name he chooses for himself is Sparrow of the Weeping Mountain (you’d have to know his past to understand that one!). For as confusing as it is to have characters with multiple appellations, it’s also a symbolic necessity. Some of our characters choose their names as a rite of passage in reaching adulthood. Others must earn their name, and still others are born with one.

For me, assigning a name to a character is one of the most difficult tasks I encounter. I think I’ve come up with the perfect one…until Matt says it aloud and falls off the couch laughing. I swallow my pride and try again. It’s not a gift of mine, finding that perfect name, but I will always see it as the most important point in character creation.

-Stefanie