MORE ABOUT NAMES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 8, Issue 186, 15 January 1943, Page 6

MORE ABOUT NAMES

(Written for "The Listener" by

A.

M.

HAT was an excellent little article by "Kay" the other day on names of books, but to the person really interested in the theme it was like giving a saucer of strawberries to a strawberry lover. There is so much to say on the subject. The best title of a novel is, I think, "Vanity Fair," and that came from another book with a great title, "Pilgrim’s Progress." But some classics have quite ordinary titles. Jane Austen rang the title bell with "Pride and Prejudice" and "Sense and Sensibility," but she also chose "Emma." George Eliot was pedestrian in some of her choices: "Adam Bede," "Silas Marner," "Daniel Deronda." On the other hand, the title of "Middlemarch," one of the dozen greatest English novels, though it may sound a bit heavy, seems to suggest the scene admirably. "Tom Jones" is most prosaically named, but the story may last as long as "Vanity Fair." An exceptional eye for titles does not always go- with exceptional literary ability. Think of A. S. M. Hutchinson’s felicity: "The Happy Warrior," "Once Aboard the Lugger" (an excellent farce), "If Winter Comes," "This Freedom." Edna Lyall, beloved by our mothers and grandmothers, chose "We Two," "Won By Waiting," "In the Golden Days" and ae

"Knight-Errant"; does anyone read her now? But Kipling put his genius into good titles (incidentally, Mr. Churchill must have finished himself with the intelligentsia when he quoted Kipling the other day, and "If" at that): "Life’s Handicap," "The Light That Failed," "Many Inventions," "Traffic and Discoveries," "Captains Courageous," "Re wards and Fairies." It’s an exciting business tracking down titles. Could you say where all the above (that is, the lifted ones), come from? Try this for a literary competition. Sometimes the author is obliging, as I think Ernest Hemingway is in his fine novel "For Whom the Bell Tolls," a perfect title and Ford Madox Hueffer was when in the last war he wrote "When Blood is Their Argument." Is there a happier title anywhere than A. P. Herbert’s "Holy Deadlock" for his story of the divorce laws? Choosing titles is a sweaty business, leading to preoccupied days and sleepless nights. The House of Dent rummaged for a long while before it thought of "Everyman" for the name of what was to prove the most popular of all libraries of reprints. "Everyman" seems so obvious, but it took a scholar to suggest it, and he got his idea from an old morality play. I'm glad "Kay" mentioned a New ZeaJand writer. We’ve produced some good titles: "The Long White Cloud," "Land of the Morning," "Check to Your King," "Restless Earth," "Man Alone," Where the Apple Reddens." I purposely don’t give the authors. "Pencarrow"’ was an inspiration for Nelle Scanlan’s series. Like "Middlemarch," it suggests a whole landscape and society. But we have one serious handicap. The name New Zealand doesn’t go well in a title, and "Zealandia" is worse.