What's in a name?

The art of naming characters

Thinking up funny character names is a lovely skill, and there are many brilliant practitioners. PG Wodehouse and Edward Gorey spring to mind.

Edward Gorey began a publishing house called The Fantod Press in 1962. Over the next few decades it published 28 books by authors and illustrators including Ogdred Weary, Mrs Regera Dowdy, Eduard Blutig, O. Müde, Raddory Gewe, Edward Pig, Garrod Weedy, Awdrey-Gore, and someone named Om - all were Edward Gorey himself.

“Fantod” is an archaic word from C19th meaning:

a state or attack of uneasiness or unreasonableness.

I really like the idea of having an attack of unreasonableness. In fact - my goodness! - I have them sometimes!!

Edward Gorey with a fantod, which he first embodied as this dragon character in “The Unstrung Harp”, 1953.

I’m sure inventing names is a thing that is also aided by carrying around a notebook to write one’s sudden inspirations in. I feel like many a good (and bad) idea has slipped through my fingers for want of writing it down.

Carrying a notebook around is one of my constant, failed, intentions. But I suspect even if it hung in front of my face, in a harmonica-playing hoist, I wouldn’t write in it. I’m terrible at taking photos during fun times - I tell myself it’s because I want to enjoy the moment, but really I think it’s inertia. I just keep doing whatever is happening, and don’t stop to take photos/notes. I am extremely Newton’s First Law of motion:

Newton's First Law of Motion (Inertia) An object at rest remains at rest, and an object in motion remains in motion at constant speed and in a straight line unless acted on by an unbalanced force.

This is why I also hate filling up cars with petrol, and why I once ran out at the traffic light on Shepherds Bush Green (genuinely horrifying.)

Anyway, despite my lack of writing them down, I have some character names that have stuck:

Missy Fotherington-Gore - not a thrilling name, but I had a good arc for her - she’s a Jilly Cooper-style romantic novelist whose breakout novel, Stirrups, is about a gynaecologist who becomes a star horse jockey.

Poisson Pen - a fish who writes horrible take-downs in the local paper.

Nom Nom de Plume - a food critic whose identity is unknown.

Doctor Ümlaut - not sure who he is yet, but a Dr Ümlaut had a mention in an instagram comic I made in 2020, Ratpunzel:

Re-reading the above, do I need to make a comic about the Rumpelstiltskin Sex Scandal?! Though perhaps it’s one of those events that is better in the imagination, and only disappointing when you get there.

And Dr Ümlaut is going to appear in a new comic I’m working on:

Thanks for reading! Come back next week for the RSS - look for the pampas grass outside the goblin grotto.