Eileen Chang
Translated by Karen Kingsbury
[1] I MYSELF have an unbearably vulgar name, am well aware of the fact, and have no plans to change it.But I remain extremely interested in people’s names.
[2] To give someone a name is a simple and small-scale act of creation.When the patriarch of days gone by would sit in winter with his feet propped up on a foot-warming brazier, smoking a water pipe, and pick out a name for a newly arrived grandson, his word was all.If the boy was called Guang-mei (Brighten the Threshold), he would end up doing his best to redound honor on the gates of the family house.If he was called Zuyin(Ancestral Privilege) or Chengzu (Indebted to the Ancestor), he would be compelled always to remember his forebears.If he was called Hesheng (Lotus Born), his life would take on something of the coloring of a pond in June.Characters in novels aside, there aren’t many people whose names adequately describe what they are like in reality (and often the opposite is the case and the name represents something they need or lack — nine of ten poor people have names like Jingui [Gold Precious], Ah Fu [Richie], Dayou [Have a Lot].) But no matter how or in what manner, names inevitably become entangled with appearance and character in the process of creating a complete impression of a person.And this is why naming is a kind of creation.
[3] I would like to give someone a name, even though I’ve yet to have the opportunity to do so.It seems that only parents and schoolmasters in the countryside have this right.Besides these, we must also include venerable gentlemen and grand dames who buy servant girls and dancehall madams who procure young women.Such a shame that these people are so sloppy in their execution of these duties, since they rely entirely on precedent: little kids are invariably called Maotou (Kid), Er Maotou (Kid Number Two), San Maotou (Kid the Third); servant girls become Ruyi (As You Wish); and taxi dancers are given foreignsounding names like Manna.