Arvo

To Arto, Arlo, Aldo, let us add Arvo, as in Arvo Pärt.

Lois

This post is inspired, in part, by a native Russian speaker's inability to properly pronounce "Lois Weber." First he called her Lewis, then he called her Loy.

It is also inspired by something I occasionally reflect on, namely, mid-to-late-nineties/early-aughts indie-rock bands that have (old-timey) feminine names, e.g., Lois (or am I thinking of this Lois?), Ida, Beulah. A related post might be on all the names of women that appear (what is the auditory equivalent of "appear"?) in Destroyer songs, e.g., Michelle ("The Very Modern Dance"), Tabitha ("Your Blood"), Contessa ("Streets of Fire"), but there's not much I can about that, and I've already fallen behind on keeping this blog a lively thing. So you'll have to imagine it, or just listen to a Destroyer song yourself.

Carroll

I've elsewhere averred that I don't think or, really, care much about pen names, but I just mentioned Doublets so I guess I'll go with a riff on Lewis Carroll. The way I remember his real first name is by noting that Carroll is like Carl which is like Charles, and that his next begins with L, much like Lewis does; I then muse that perhaps his name is Charles Louis, or Lyman, but that's not right, nor that, and eventually I sort everything out and it all comes back to me. And then I think about Carroll O'Connor, whom I used to confuse with Carol Burnett; might we also note that Frances Hodgson Burnett had a son named Vivian, which introduced me to that as a masculine name? I could go on. That is what this blog is for.

Arto

Arto Lindsay's given name is Arthur Morgan Lindsay, so I guess you could consider this post a reprise. But this name intrigues me in its own right. Actually, that's not right. I like thinking about in relationship to two other names: Arlo, as in Guthrie, and Aldo, as in Tambellini. Can we play Doublets with these three names? How do we get from Arlo to Aldo?

Arthur

I don't particularly care for the fiction of Michael Cunningham, but I can nonetheless appreciate this appreciation:

Let's try to forget that the words "Call me Ishmael" mean anything, and think about how they sound.
Listen to the vowel sounds: ah, ee, soft i, aa. Four of them, each different, and each a soft, soothing note. Listen too to the way the line is bracketed by consonants. We open with the hard c, hit the l at the end of "call," and then, in a lovely act of symmetry, hit the l at the end of "Ishmael." "Call me Arthur" or "Call me Bob" are adequate but not, for musical reasons, as satisfying.

Penny

This is post #99 for CHEW ON THIS, so in anticipation of post #100 I thought I'd give you all a name that makes sense.

Here are other number names, with occasional sources:

1 - Una
2 - Tuesday
3 - Tre
4 - Anan
5 - Quinn
6 - Sextus
7 - Seven
8 - Octavius
9 - Nona
10 - Ten

Marcellus

Cassius Marcellus Clay: abolitionist.
Cassius Marcellus Clay: painter, musician, father of Cassius Marcellus and Rudolph Valentino.
Cassius Marcellus Clay: Muhammad Ali.
Cassius Marcellus Cornelius Clay: this guy.

Allen

William Shawn married Cecille Lyon. They had three children: Wallace (Wally), Allen, and Mary. Starting in 1950, and until his death in 1992, William Shawn had an affair with Lillian Ross.

I recite these well-rehearsed facts because the outlier here is Mary—not because she is autistic and lives in an institution, though that is true, but because she is the only one in this mini-narrative without a double-l in her name.

Rico

In D.H. Lawrence's St. Mawr, St. Mawr is a horse ("The man repeated [his name], with a slight Welsh twist"), Lou Witt is Louise (from Louisiana)—and there's also, in this novella, a Lewis—is Lady Carrington, and her husband Rico is Sir Henry. Everyone has names, and many of them, and they are all of those names at once, but only one at a time. It is wordplay, nameplay. Thus:

"Isn't Fred flirting perfectly outrageously with Lady Carrington!--She looks so sweet!" cried Flora, over her coffee-cup. "Don't you mind, Harry!"

They called Rico 'Harry'! His boy-name.

"Only a very little," said Harry. "L'uomo è cacciatore."

"Oh, now, what does that mean?" cried Flora, who always thrilled to Rico's bits of affectation.

"It means," said Mrs. Witt, leaning forward and speaking in her most suave voice, "that man is a hunter."

Even Flora shrank under the smooth acid of the irony. "Oh, well now!" she cried. "If he is, then what is woman?"

"The hunted," said Mrs. Witt, in a still smoother acid. "At least," said Rico, "she is always game!"

"Ah, is she though!" came Fred's manly, well-bred tones. "I'm not so sure."

Mrs. Witt looked from one man to the other, as if she were dropping them down the bottomless pit.

D.J.

I'm hardly the first person to think D.J. Conner or Tanner would make for an excellent disc jockey name. D.J. Conner was David Jacob and Tanner was Donna Jo—and D.J. Fontana Dominic Joseph and Shockley Donald Eugene and Caruso Daniel John—but A.J. Soprano was Anthony, Jr.; from this should I extrapolate that most deejays are first name-middle name derivations and most ehjays juniors? No, but A.J. Burnett is Allan James and A.J. Cook is Arthur James or Andrea Joy. And that Soprano kid was actually Anthony John, it turns out. So forget it!

Oxide

The name of one of the Pang brothers, co-directors of films like The Eye. The other brother: Danny. I cannot come up with an analogous sibling set.

Noël

I only just realized that Noël Carroll—he of, for instance, Mystifying Movies: Fads and Fallacies in Contemporary Film Theory—must've gotten a lot of "What Child Is This" growing up. I mean, his name is Christmas Carol. Or even just Carol Carol. Noël, Noël, Noël, Noël...

Lucy

Frank Tashlin:

Unless-Jesus-Christ-Had-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned

See James Davidson, "Flat-Nose, Stocky and Beautugly." The 17th century Nevaeh? Or maybe closer to the Wizard of Oz's full name: Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkel Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs. O.Z.P.I.N.H.E.A.D., meet U-J-C-H-D-F-T-T-H-B-D. Uj for short?

Cameron

This week's New Yorker profile of Tavi—not Tavie—Gevinson:

Steve Gevinson, Tavi's father, a tall, gawky man of about sixty, came downstairs, wearing pleated shorts and a polo shirt. (Everyone in the family wears glasses.) He shook hands with one of the Barbie cameramen, who introduced himself as Cameron.

"That's a good name for a cameraman!" Steve said.

Kenward

Kenward Elmslie: another member of the New York School who doubles as a preparatory academy.

Roland

Gosh, one of my great fears is being in seminar and referring to some essay by Ronald Barthes.

Augusta

The actor Kevin McCarthy just died. His first wife's name was Augusta. This, too, was the name of his maternal grandmother, who raised him and his siblings. Majestic!

Reuel

The actor Kevin McCarthy just died. Did you know that he was the brother of Mary McCarthy? I certainly did not. Intrigued by this new trivial bit, I did some reading up on his sister. She had a son named Reuel. Did you know that Reuel is Hebrew, meaning "friend of God"? I certainly did not. I had never heard of this name before tonight. It is one of the R's in J.R.R. Tolkien. Anyway, what I get from this is that you could have a son named Reuel and a son named Raoul—two names that look similar but are of wholly distinct origins. And a third, Royal.

Kevin

The actor Kevin McCarthy just died. He was 96. It's weird to think you could have an elderly relative named Kevin.

Fairfield

I originally intended for this post to be about Jane, a name I find immediately evocative—not of plainness, but of "Jane Awake," i.e., of Frank O'Hara and Jane Freilicher. Instead, I turn to another New York School painter, Fairfield Porter, who sounds like a prep school.