Have Name - Will Travel

The Dune universe is filled with cool and nifty names for people, places and things. Chani, Stilgar, Muad'Dib, Atreides, Irulan, Feyd-Rautha, Liet-Kynes, Arrakis, Caladan, Salusa Secundus, sietch, Giedi Prime, Arrakeen, hunter-seeker, sandworm, mentat, Tleilaxu, crysknife, Fedaykin, Kwisatz Haderach.

That just scratches the surface! We still have ornithopter, Yueh, thumper, Sayyadina... Okay, okay, I'll stop. But with all these cool words, I can't begin to imagine what the protagonist's name is! It must be badass, one befitting an epic science fiction masterpiece. After all, this is a person who will enter the halls of greats like Frankenstein, Darth Vader, even HAL 9000!

It must be great, it must...oh? What? What's his name? Really? That's...that's it?

Paul.

Paul, Paul, Paul. Paul Atreides. Paul-Muad'Dib Atreides.

Paul.

In the eight years I've known Dune, I've always wondered why the hero's name is so normal. It stands apart from all the other words in the book, many of which are Arabic in origin. Why would Herbert give a character alive nearly ten thousand years from now a name from our era? Of all the ones to survive that many millennia, it's Paul? Somehow I don't think it's an allusion to Paul McCartney. There must be a reason, especially since his mother's is Jessica. That one's also common, though it's more interesting than Paul: it was invented by Shakespeare!

Alas, the question is not one I've ever really bothered to answer. But what this has made me consider is the importance of names. Whenever there's a new character for me to work with, considerable time is spent finding a name that fits. Truth be told, I spend more time with that task than I should because I overthink it. One of my friend penned a short script in which the protagonist was a clerk named Clark. Clark the clerk: it was a conscious decision on my friend's part and yet it was so simple.

Then you have writers like Shakespeare who go all-out crazy with their names. Take Iago, for example. One of my professors argued that if you separate the letters in Iago, you get "I ago", a combo of English/Spanish (though there's an "h" missing) which translates to "I do." Why would this be the meaning? Well, Iago is the one who acts the most in the play, the one who does and causes the plot to unfold. Shakespeare probably just made that up but it works surprisingly well. Then again, it's Shakespeare: the guy could write dick jokes that had thematic meaning.

Names say a lot about us. They establish ethnicity, culture, and their meanings can reveal someone's character. Mine just says I'm from a Spanish-speaking country; I am not, after all, a "new house." But they also have power, as Doctor Who tells us. The oldest running joke in the series has us guessing at the name of this wacky and serious centuries old being. Since the Davies era, this joke has become a central theme, telling us that names have power. It's Rumpelstiltskin, except our imp is a lovable bow-tie wearing, dangerous goofball. That's one possible reason the Doctor - and, indeed, most other Time Lords - never reveals his name.

And let's not even mention the tetragrammaton...

In the script I'm currently working on, 90 Miles, I have the biggest cast of characters I've ever worked with. It's hard trying to remember where they all are, who died, or who speaks what language. So you can imagine how frustrating it was to name them all. Normally, my characters' handles always allude to someone else. My protagonist, Ana, takes her name from the protagonist of The Spirit of the Beehive, Victor Erice's allegorical critique of post-war Spain. Both of these young girls have curious minds and live in countries ruled by political turmoil. Plus, it's a helluva good movie, even if my brain couldn't comprehend it at first.

The other characters are carefully named. Ana has a best friend called Jose, as do I, and her grandfather and mine both share a name. The smugglers she encounters allude to real-life 18th-century pirates, as well as Long John Silver. It's nepotism mixed with allusions, one of the easiest literary cocktails to mix.

But there are three central characters whose names were chosen at random while I sat in front my laptop, telling myself, "Shit, what I am going to call them?" Ana's parents, Victor and Gloria, don't quite strike a chord with me; I'm pretty ambivalent toward their names. Honestly, the closest allusion I could come up with for Gloria was Sofia Vergara's character in Modern Family. Victor? Well, I knew a Victor in middle school...

Now it's too late to change them. Every time I say the names aloud, the characters come to life. If I try to rename them, it feels wrong; they're no longer the same people. Their names and identities are intertwined. Whatever meanings they could have are now up to interpretation - I didn't give them any. And if you can think of a good one, do share it. I'll be sure to steal it credit you.

Despite all this thinking, sometimes a name jumps into my head and I totally want to make up a story with it. Celeste and Camille have been on my mind lately. Drusilla recently popped up - though she'd probably be called Dru (Drew?) for short. Funnily enough, this rarely happens with male names. They don't tend to call out to me. Except Alexander (or any variation thereof), but that's because you'd have a hell of a lot to live up to if you're called "defender of man" and don't follow in the footsteps of good ol' Alexander the Great. Er, maybe I'm just projecting.

As for the meaning of Paul, quick research reveals it means "small" or "humble." Jessica, meanwhile, means "foresighted." Ah, now this makes sense. A woman belonging to a sect hoping to create the ultimate prescient man gives birth to a small, humble boy who just so happens to end up ruling the entire known universe.

Now I want a son just to name him Paul...