Magic Names: Onomastics in theFantasies of Ursula Lr Guin

JOHN ALrGEO

Nu."* in literature have long been studied- Litera{r onornastics is,indeed" one of the rnaj<r branches of nanre study- If any proof of that factis needed, one need only look at the program of the l98l annual meetingof the American Name Society" in which two-fifihs of the papers nrcredevoted to nanres in literature, or to the annual Conference on LiteraryOnomastics and Literary Orwrnastics Srudias an-anged by Grme Alvarez-Altman, or to Thc Stu4, of Nomes in Literature: A Bibliography, byElizabeth M. Rajec.

Mo6t literary ommastic studies have been devoted to charactonyms.'ftrc ta]rm characlrnyn seems not to be entered in any general dictionaryso far" altlrcugh it has been current anxxrg students of narnes for sornetime. It was appa.rently invented by Thomas Elliott Berry, who proposedthe term in a rrcte in Word Study in 194.9. Kelsie Harder hel@ topopularize it with his study of Faulkner's novels. lt has since bee.l muchused; half a dozen items in the Rajec bibllrgmphy have tharactonlm intheir titbs, and doubtless a good many others do in their texts. Berrydefircd the term simply as a "'trait name,'" that is, a name somehowappropriate to a character- My impression is that ir is usually promuncedwith first-syllable stress" although I heard it given stress on the secondsyllable in a paper read at the American Dialect Society's annual meetingin 1973. It is sometirnes sryli ctwracternym and has such synonyms asIabel mme, attribative nanv, arl chtracterizing tume -

Although there have been rnany studies of panicular charactonyms invarious works of literature, tbe charactonym itself has not received muchattention- That is, ifie tbeory of literary naming has been relatively ne-glected. ffhere have been studies by Gerus-Tarn4nrccky, trlicolaisen" andRudnydkyj, among others-) Yel how an author invents appropriate namesis wortl more attenrion than it has received- The ways of name making arernanifold; there are too many pmibilities to cover easily, so here thefocus is on just two extreme kinds of charactonyrns, exteme in tfims of

iPid lv- trftt,, v.a t No ?, 198: 59

6{l Joln Algeo

ftaw the name is suitable to the character. The two kinds of nilme are

illustrated from two novels by ttrrsula K- k Cuin: The Lathe of Heaven

and A Wimrd of Earthsea.Lnrsuta K. k Guin is one of the most accomplished contemporary

writers of both fantasy and science fiction, two literary genres that arc

alike in being nonmainstream fiction but are in some ways quile distinct

ftom each otler. Science flrction is usually set in a high+ech' filturislicversion of the wortd we know, but modified in some significant way.

Science fiction is a literary gedanken experiment, in which the author asks

wlar rhe world would be like if it were different in certain specific but

more or less probable ways from the ordinary world of lea and toast'

Fantasy, on the other hand, usually has a low-tech' medieval setting that is

clearly no simple variation on the earth we know; it is a seconda4i creation

(to use J. R- R. Tolkien's useful term) which is inhabited by legendary

creanJres like dragons and in which magic works about as u'ell as comput-

er-programming does among us. The use of nanrcs in science ficlion has

been investigated, for example, by Robert Plank and John R. Krueger;

narnes in fantasy wdling have been less studied' although J. R. R'Tolkbn's nanes have received attention' for example' by Ruth S. Noel

and John finkler-Le Guin's novels have a strong anthropological flavor about thern-a

fact lhat is hardly surprising since she is the daughter of Alfred and

Theodora Krwber, who were erninent in anthrcpology and linguistics' Le

Guin's science fiction is set in worlds wbose most interesting differences

from ours are not their technology but the way their human societies have

adapted to the envircnment. For example, nThe Left Hand of Darkness a

race of andmgynous humanity lives on a planet that is in the middle of an

ice age, and the novel is concemed chiefly with how such differences of

".t ind "litttut

affect behavior. Le Cuin's best fantasy is placed in the

world of Earthsea, where there are no continenls but many small islands

set in the midst of a limitless ocean' On these islands magiclans are as

cornmon as rnackerels are in tle sea- How would people act in a world ofsea and spells and an orcasional dragon? That is the theme of the Earthsea

tales. As worlds and lives differ, so do names- And to illustrate the point

of rhis essay, the oaming techniques t-e Guin has used in her science

fiction show sone significant differences from those in her fantasy- (The

only earlier study of Le Guin's naming practices I know is Walter E'

Me)rer's careful examination of the canonical form of names in one of her

science-fiction worts. )The lnhe of Heaven is a good example of one kind of naming tech-

nique. It is a science-hction novel set in the year 2002 in Seattle' Wash-

Ursula Le Guin 6l

inglon- The two principal charnclers are George Orr and William Haber.George is a dreanrcr, a Frsive sort of chap who discovers that from timeto lime he has a powerful &eam (an "effective dream" he calls it) thatchanges reality. When George wakes up, whatever he has dreamed thenexiss in r€ality ard has, as far as everyone otJrcr that George himselfknows, always €xisted. NoMy else is awarc that the nature of realigshifts rrith George's dreams-nobody, thal is, except Haber. Haber is asecond-rate psychologist to whom George has been mandatorily referredfor virolaring the lirnits on drug use (in an effort lo stop himself fromdrcamirg). Haber induces hypnotic sleep in George, and, being presentwhen one of lhe effective dreams occurs, realizes what thos€ drcams do tothe world. Haber then sets about, thmugh hypnotic suggestion, to controlGeorge's drEarm and thus to rernold the world nearer to his own desires-Unfortunately dreams are controlled by the subconscious, which takessuggestions but twists their interpretations. So things often tum out otherthan Haber intends.

The names of these two characters mirror their personalities closely andtrinspafenlly. Gorge Orr is uncertain, diffident, a born vicrim because heis trusting and essentially good-natured. Under his plodding ald sirnpleexterior he has, however, a depth of strengrh and integrity and courage-He is a perfectly balarrced and adaptable individual who accepts whateyercom6 to him because he is centered and whole. William Haber, bycontrast, is assertive, exploitative, and ego{entric- He has a messiahcomplex, being a do-.gooder who is so intenl on improving the worldaccording to his own vision of what is desirable that he is unable torecognize lbe disaster he is creating. As George is passive and yin-like,Haber is active and yanglike- George is a poelic dreamer who changesthe world without trying or wanting to. Haber is a social scientisl-ascherner who plots to improve the world-and, as Mencken observed,"When A aruxlys or injures B on the pretense of improving B, A is ascoundrel- "

George, from the Greek, is etymologically 'farrner,' ooe connectedwith Gca, mother earth. So George is earthy in his simplicity, and hecauses things to grow-new worlds raised into the light of reality from thedark sutterranean loam of his subconscious dreams- His given name isetynologically appropriate, involving a pun rhat is integral with thehistory of the word. It is organically suiled ro him-

George's last name, Orr, is perhaps a double pun. First and mostcerlain, it puns on the conjunction ar. Because he appean indecisive, onecharacter refers to him as "Mr. Either Orr. " Being perfectly balancedbetween extrcmes, he measures in the middle on all psychological tesa, a

62 John Algeo

fact that Haber comments on: " lf you put - . . all [your scores] onto the

same graph you sit srnack in the middle at 50. Dominance, for example; Ithink you were 48.8 on that. Neither dominant nor submissive. Indepen-

dence/dependence-sarne thing. . . . Both, neither. Either, or"' (pp-

133-34).The other possible pun on George's last narne is ore. His mind is the

raw stuff out of which new realities are fashioned: "He could be born intoany world. He had no character. He was a lump of clay, a block ofuncarved wood," or, we might say, a piece of ore (p. 127).

Another significance ofGeorge's name is suggested by the fact that theUnited States of the novel underwent a revolution in which the constitu-tion was rewritten setting up a police state. The year of that event wasl9M (p. 1M). Thus George Orr is an unwell George Orwell.

Haber's names are appropriale in the sarne way, though less striking intheir associations. His given name , William, suggests his willfulness. In amoment of ecstalic anticipation llaber exults: "We're on the brink ofdiscovering and contmlling, for the good of all mankind, a whole newforce, an €ntirc new field of antientropic energy, ofth€ life-force, of tlrcwill to act, to do, to change!" (pp. 135-36). William is rclostically ''lamwill," and the assertion of his self-will is Haber's dominant characteris-tic. His last name suggests Latin habere or German haben, both with th€sense 'have, possess, hold." In his name, William Haber thus says, I amthe will to have, to control, to dominale.

It is easy to s€e why Le Guin chose the names of tbe two principalcharaciers in this story. They are tradilional characterizing names, withtransparcnt motivations. Their associations are public. They involve punsthat are etymological or that anyone can recognize and a literary allusionto a well-known novel. The names fairly invite the reader to interpretthem.

A Wizard of Earthsea is a different sort of novel in several respects"including lhe sort of name its characters have- lts neverland sening is an

archipelago in the midst ofthe grcat ocean- As in all high fantasy. magicplays a role. There is magic of all kinds, ranging from simple slight ofhand to true magic-which is the control of reality by the use of names-Every person has first a child name, given by one's mother- Then one has

a use name , a kind of nickname alluding to appearanc€ or behavior, whichname may be different in different localities, as one's appeaEmce orbehavior changes from time to tirne fi from place to place- And finallyone has a tnre name, which is a secret, told only to one's clos€st and mosttrusted friends. To know tlrc tnre name of any person orof anything istohave power over that person or thing.

Ursula Le Guin 63

The protagonist of lhe novel begins life with rhe child name Dzzy. He I

has as a use n ne Sporrowhawt, because he has learned to call that birdfrom the sky and to control it. His true name, hor,vever, is Ged_ lt wasgiven (or perhaps more accurately, revealed) ro him by the wizard Ogionwhen lhe boy came of age. The high wizards of the lsland ofRoke (where :

there is a kind of Advanced Instiote for Magic and Narning) are the onlyones who know the true nanrcs of all rhings.

The novel is a Bildungsroman. Le Guin berself has said that its theme is I

" 'coming of age, " a process foreshadowed by the change of narne that tbe I

protagonist undergoes in his passage through the rites of manhood. Thestory is about the integration of the self (in Jungian terrm), as Ged in anact ofyouthful bravado raises a shadowy specter that he cannot control but ,

that he must eventually meet and become reconciled with. Ged gainspower over tbe shadow and exorcizes ir only by discowring its true name" :

at the climax ofthe novel- The names of other characters in the story areNentnerle, the archmage of Roke; Verclr, H's best fii€nd; and, Serret,an anima figure with whom Ged must contend . These names are typical ofthose in the trilogy of Earthsea books and are in striking contrast with themmes Ir Guin gave her characlers in The Inthe of Heaven. Wbatever .

associations these names have , they are not public but private and unavail- |

able to the gerrcral reader.le Guin herselfhas cornrnented on how she arrived at the nanrcs in thls

novel ("Dreams Must Explain Themselves, " pp. 49-50):

I did not delaberately invent Earrhsea, I did nor think ..Hey wow-ishnds I

are archeqrpes and arcbipelagos arc spemrchctypes and let's build us anarchlFlago!" I am not an engineer. bul an explorcr. I discovered Earthsea-

More specifically, she has said (p- 5l):Three srnall islalrds are nanred for my children, rheir baby-names: one gels :

a little jovial and irrespomible, given ahe ftEedom to create a world out of i

nothing at all- (Power comrpts-) None of the other narnes ..rneans" any-thing that I know of, rhough their sound is nrore or less rncaningfitl to rne.

The last sentenoe is a significant observation. There is no reason todoubt [-e Guin when she tells us that for her the only meaning of rnost ofrhe rnagical names of her fantasy novel is a prodrct of their sound. Suchrneaning is not coglritive sense at all, but incantational, mantric meaning.It has more in common with sound symbolism or the phonestheme thanwith semantic features. lr Guin goes on (pp. 5l-53):

People often ask how I think of nanps in fantasies, and again I have toanswer that I fild them, that I hear them- This is an arportant subject in this

@ tohn Algeo

context. FrDm lhal first slory on, nzmrrg has been rlr€ €ss€nce of t}le an-magic as practiced in Earthsea. For me, as for the wizards, lo know thename of an island or a character is lo know the island or the person. Usuallythe name comes of itself, bul sornetim€s on€ must be very careful: as I was

wlth lhe prolagonisl, whose true name is Ged. I worked (in collatnrationwlth a wizard named Ogion) for a long tirne trying to "lislen for'" hisname, and making certain it really was his name. This all sounds very

mystical and indeed lherc are asp€cts of it I do not undersland' but it is a

pragmatic business too, since if the name had been wrong tbe character

would have been wrong-misbeSonen, misunderstood.A man who read the ms. for Parnassus thought "Ged" was meant to

sugeest "God-" That slrcok me badly. I considered changing the name lncase there wer€ olher such ingenious minds waiting to pounc€- Bul Icouldn't do so. The fellow's name was Ged and no two ways about it. . ' .

I said that to know the true nanre is to know the thing, for me' and for the

wizards- This implies agooddeal about the ''meaning" of tbe trilogy' and

about me- The trilogy is, ir one aspect, aboul the artist. The artisl as

magician. The Trickster. Prospero. - - -

Wizardry is artistry. The trilogy is then, in this sense, about an, the

creafive experience, the crsalive Process- There is always this circutarity infantasy. The snake devours its cwn tail- Dreams musl explain lh€mselves-

After such comments, it would be worse than presumPtuous lo "ex-plain" the narnes in A Wizard of Earthsea. Names, like dreams' must

explain themselves. And, in fact, there is no other "explanation" for sucb

magic nanEs-in the sense that we cirn explain the names in' for example,

The ltthe of Heaven. Gel is not so called because he is to remind us of"God" or of anyone or anything els€. Ged is Ged- That's what he's

called. Yet the name is not arbitrary-it is exacdy right and he could notbe called anything else. As l-e Guin has said, his name is Ged, and no twoways about it- Names in fantasy are private to the writer and to lhe reader.

Their meaning depends on their sound. At some nondiscursive level ofknowing, readers of AWizard of Eanhseaknaw tllall Ged is the true name

of the character-it fits.There is an anecdote in Zen Buddhism thal is relevant here. Zen is a

form of Buddhism especially concerned with a direct and immediate

experience of reality- Zen Buddhism, like k Guin's naming of her

fantasy characters, is a pragmatic business. Its ideal is to see into the heart

of things, into the essential nature of human experience- The anecdote is

this: Before I studied Zen, mountains were mountains and rivers were

rivers. While I was studying Zen, rnountains came to mean far more lhanjust mountains and rivers far more than just dYers- When I had completed

my study of Zen, mountains were mountains and rivers were rivers.

Ursla I'e Guin 65

To read literature withot paying attention to the significance of the

characters' narnes is to appmach rhe literature in a pre-Zen state- GeorgeOrr is George On, and Ged is Ged- To see the significance in some

charactonyms-for example, those in llre Lathe of Heaven-is to aPproach tbem in a mid-Zen state. George Orr nreans far more than juslGeorge Orr. But to grasp the significance of other charactonyms-forexarnple, the magical nanrcs of Earthsea-is to understand thoce names ina full-7no state. Ged is Ged.

Narnes like Gearge Orr that invite a mid-Zen approach give the onoma-

tologist a tot to talk abour. And so they have been very popular withstudents of literary onomastics. Names like Cred that require t f lZrnapproach don't leave rnuch room for discussion. and so they have been

overlooked. But I suspect thar a good many writers are like Unula [rGuin when she writes her fantasies- the names tbey give cbaracters are

long thought on, care.fhlly considered, exactly righr--$ut are oot suscept-

ible to clever analysis- They are magical names, and can be appreciated

only with a sense of the magical, the fitness of name to thing.The two types of charactonym exemplified in these books by Lnrsula Le

Guin are extrernes in what is surely a conlinuum of litera4r names. An in-between poiot in that continuurn is lhe place-name in her short story "'The

Ones Who Walk Away from Ornelas" (whose relevarrce was kindlybrought to my anention by C. A. Hilgartner) ' The story is about the city ofOmelas, where everyone is perfecrly, utopianly happy----everyone, that

is, except one wretched child who is kept in solltary confinement. in pain'filth" and torment. The wetl-being of rhe joyous citizens of Omelas

depends on the continual misery ofthat one lost soul. Most of the citizens

accept the fact that lheir happiness unfonunately depends on tlre sufferingof another- But a few, when they leam the basis for their town's prosper-

ity, renounce the comfort bought at sucb an expense. even rbough it is the

expense of a single scapegoat, and go into rhe hardship and danger ofvoluntary exile- They ate the ones who walk away from Omelas.

In an lntroduction ro dE story (p- 276), [r Guin says lhat the idea for ilcame to her from a pasmge in rffilliam James, although ir also appears in

Dostoyevsky's Brothers Karanazov, a fact she had forgotten when she

wmte the story:

Of course I dkln'r read James ard sit down and say, Now l'll wrire a

story aboul that "'lct soul-" ll seldom works that simply- I sat down and

$aned a srory, just becaus€ I felt llke ir, wilh norhing but the word"'Onelas" in mind- It came from a rud sign: Salem (Oregon) backwards-

Don't you rcad road signs backwards? FOTS. WOIS nerdlihc. Ocsicnarf

Nas . - . Salem equals schelomo equals salaam equals Peace- Melas- O

6 toha Algeo

rnelas- Ornelas. Hornme h€las. "Where do you getyour ideas from' Ms leGuin?" Frorn forgetting Dctoyevsky and readiog rcad signs backwards'n*urally- Wherc else?

Omelns is a rntv,igic name, sort of. It would take a rare reader to mak€ the

associations thar [.e Guin has shown the nilme has for her- Salezt means

'peace' lhough in Salem, Massachusetts, they buml women for witch-craft. It is cognar€ with Arabic salacnr, a greeting, though in the story the

brave characters bid farewell 1o their Omelas, which is Saiezr O. reversed,

a to$'n whose peace is based on the oppression of one person and whichtlrerefore is rejected by thoee with conscience. Melas ts Greek for'black'--rhe dart shade hidden beneath the brightness of Omelas. One-/as is homophonouswith homnc Mlas'man, alas!' It takes a considerableingenuity, pedraps even for le Guin, to arrive at such interpretations ofthe name- It is likely that she began with the sound and only later realized

irs semantic poteotial. It is thus a panly magic and pardy transparcntrnme, a kind of opaque charactonym. These two sorts of literaq/ names-the magical and the transparent-arc not discrete categories, but dfuec-

tions rn a continuous scale. Ornzlas is sonrewhere in the rniddle- Yet the

distinction betrreen tbe two extrcrne types of charactonym should be

clear.Ir is sometinrs said that we can recognize three stages of scholarship-

In the first, we gather information. In the second, we classify and catego-

rize the data gathered, looking for palterns in it. ln t}e third, we seek forgeneral rules and causes, explanations of the pattems lhat we can use as a

basis for predicting future data. Onomastics has generally been in the firstof those stages; and a useful, necessary stage it is. Serious work in tlrcrhird stage is a bng way off, if indeed it is even possible for a disciplinelike onomastics, which is clearly gersreswrss ensch$tlich, nol ,uturwis-

However, the second stage is possible for orrcmastics rightnow. And as we gather our data, we should attemPt to furd the pattems init. The present essay as meant as a very small step in that directioo. h tries

to respond in a modest way to the challenge in W. F. H. Nicolaisen'skeynote address at the ninth Literary Onomastics Studies conference, achallenge thar dl shrdents of nanes in literature should do their best tomeet.

Tlrc L-lniversity of Georgia

Ursula It Gvitt 6',t

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