Sharing names

[Wanda Sherratt]

No: HPFGUIDX 98620

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "antoshachekhonte" 
<antoshachekhonte at y...> wrote:
> Honestly, I think the most obvious reason is the one that Tom Jr. 
himself gave Harry in the 
> Chamber of Secrets: He hated is father, hated his father's name, 
with which he was 
> saddled, and therefore changed his name to... well, I can't say 
Voldie any more, but, you 
> know, Lord Thingy. 
> 
That's not quite what I was getting at.  What I mean is that JKR 
invented all these characters - the names they have are the names 
SHE gave them.  Some names are just ordinary names:  Bill, Charlie, 
Ron, Percy, Harry, etc.  Some names are more "invented" and kind of 
signal the sort of person they belong to:  Slytherin & Draco (with 
their snake imagery), Malfoy, Filch, Peeves, etc.  Then there are 
these two cases alone, where a parent and child have the same name.  
If it had been established as a wizarding tradition - if the first 
Weasley son was named Arthur, or Harry's father was also Harry, or 
it was even just a pureblood tradition, I wouldn't have remarked on 
it.  But here comes this break in the usual pattern, and lo and 
behold, for one of them it turns out that the names were done that 
way for a *reason*.  As Hercule Poirot says, when someone who always 
does something one way suddenly does it differently, it often 
indicates that something out of the ordinary is happening.

What young Tom Riddle eventually does with his name in the story 
doesn't explain why he has that name in the first place - why that 
name and no other.  Only the author knows that.  If it was merely to 
establish a link to his father, well, they already share the same 
surname.  If he had to be called "Tom" in order to preserve the "I 
am Lord Voldemort" anagram, that doesn't explain why his father 
couldn't have been George Riddle.  The fact is, having two 
characters with the same name DOES create confusion, as you 
discovered in your own fiction, and yet Rowling did it anyway.  I'm 
sure she didn't just run dry one day and figure, "Oh, hell, it's too 
hot out to think of a new name, I'll just call him Tom, and nobody 
will notice."  (Reminds me of a MST3K episode, where a movie editor 
was named Leon Leon - 'Must have had the laziest parents in the 
world!' was the comment.)  No, I think there's a purpose to this, I 
just can't figure out what it could be.  Not surprising - I doubt 
many people figured out the trick with the names in GoF until it was 
explained.  Maybe your time travel idea is on track - I've always 
had a weak spot for time travel as one possible element in the 
evolution of this story, and it may turn out to be significant.

Wanda