Naming Quotes

“Elodin pointed down the street. "What color is that boy's shirt?"

"Blue."

"What do you mean by blue? Describe it."

I struggled for a moment, failed. "So blue is a name?"

"It is a word. Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts. There are seven words that will make a person love you. There are ten words that will break a strong man's will. But a word is nothing but a painting of a fire. A name is the fire itself."

My head was swimming by this point. "I still don't understand."

He laid a hand on my shoulder. "Using words to talk of words is like using a pencil to draw a picture of itself, on itself. Impossible. Confusing. Frustrating." He lifted his hands high above his head as if stretching for the sky. "But there are other ways to understanding!" he shouted, laughing like a child. He threw both arms to the cloudless arch of sky above us, still laughing. "Look!" he shouted tilting his head back. "Blue! Blue! Blue!”
― Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind

“There is a Quichua riddle: El que me nombra, me rompe. Whatever names me, breaks me. The solution, your course, is "silence." But the truth is, anyone who knows your name can break you in two.”
― Carmen Maria Machado, In the Dream House

“Most of us have nicknames—annoying, endearing, embarrassing.

But what about your true name?

It is not necessarily your given name. But it is the one to which you are most eager to respond when called.

Ever wonder why?

Your true name has the secret power to call you.”
― Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

“Hello, Lucy. Do you name all your weapons, Grunthor?”

“O’ course. It’s tradition.”

Rhapsody nodded, understanding coming into her eyes. “That makes perfect sense. Do you find that you fight better with a weapon you’ve named?”

“Yep.”

Her eyes began to sparkle with excitement. “Why, Grunthor, in a way, you’re a Namer, too!”

The giant broke into a pleased grin. “Well, whaddaya know. Should Oi sing a lit’le song?”

“No,” said Rhapsody and Achmed in unison.”
― Elizabeth Haydon, Rhapsody: Child of Blood

“Ernest, your name shall be Hengest which is the Germanic name for a stallion.”
― Michael G. Kramer, Full Story of the Anglo-Saxon Invasion

“I speculate over some of the Anglo nomenclature of birds: Wilson's snipe, Forster's tern . . . : What natural images do these names conjure up in our minds? What integrity do we give back to the birds with our labels.”
― Terry Tempest Williams, Pieces of White Shell

“They called him John Storm: John after his grandfather, but Storm after his father and his mother.”
― John Crowley, Little, Big

“What's your name?'
'Names!' she sniffed, rolling her eyes. 'People always want names, don't they? They're mad about naming. I will let the moment name me.' she eyed Jack expectantly.
'You want me to name you?' he asked.
'People from the other side are very dull,' she sighed.
'Give yourself a name for me. I don't need naming for myself, do I?”
― Isobelle Carmody, Greylands

“New Rule: Don't name your kid after a ballpark. Cubs fans Paul and Teri Fields have named their newborn son Wrigley. Wrigley Fields. A child is supposed to be an independent individual, not a means of touting your own personal hobbies. At least that's what I've always taught my kids, Panama Red and Jacuzzi.”
― Bill Maher, The New New Rules: A Funny Look At How Everybody But Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass

“From the day whe arrived at her husband's home, no one called her by her name.”
― Lauretta Ngcobo, And They Didn't Die

“The action of a thing is the same as the naming of it - is, in fact, the real name. The trees creak and they are saying, 'trees creak through the long night.' The long night - what is it? Trees creaking. There wasn't anything that tied life's moments together, except life. And when it was gone?”
― Jesse Ball, The Curfew

“To let blessed babies go dangling and dawdling without names, for months and months, was enough to ruin them for life.”
― Kate Douglas Wiggin, The Birds' Christmas Carol

“We are not how the universe knows itself.
We are how humans know the universe.
Words and thoughts are our way of knowing, not THE way of knowing.
Translating a mountain into a word, into a measurement, does not bring new knowledge into the world, it brings new knowledge into us. The mountain was perfectly in touch with its own wholeness without neurons, without language, without learning our name for it.
We may have spotted the shores of understanding from our small boat, but we certainly didn't invent them.”
― Jarod K. Anderson, Love Notes From The Hollow Tree

“[N]ames were what you wore forever, and she felt that she'd sent her daughters out in tacky rabbit fur coats when they should have been wrapped in mink.”
― Sheri Holman, The Mammoth Cheese

“We're OConchobhairs and they're our friends. Dad always said that what our name means - friend of the wolves.”
― Kirsty Murray, Bridie's Fire

“Strawberry?”
He kept his hand on the bear. “It’s silly. The bear’s name.”
“Why is that?” I kept my voice low and calm.
“All my bears are berries. So, like, there’s Blueberry and Boysenberry and Raspberry and Roddenberry.”
“Roddenberry?”
“Um, you know, the creator of Star Trek.”
― Wendy Rathbone, Little Boy Mine

“…it was the first time someone had imposed the label “German” on me to enroll me among the followers of Hitler. This violence of identity pinned on you by the other and uttered like a condemnation…”
― Mathias Énard, Compass

“I thought about having a child, naming it after you. Then I realized that child would never know its namesake & that it’s not fair to want someone just because you want someone else. Instead I named other things for you: seasons with the most holidays, the sky’s face seven seconds before or after it hails, the sound a heart hears when it is half returned, the first time I won a fight, anytime I lose anything.”
― Siaara Freeman, Urbanshee

“My insecurities demand that I put you in a box that you were not created for so that I might live the ignorant life that I was not created for.”
― Craig D. Lounsbrough

“[Citing "Alice in Wonderland"] the White Knight insists on singing Alice a song which he introduces as follows:

'The name of the song is called "Haddocks' Eyes".'

'Oh, that's the name of the song, is it?' Alice said, trying to feel interested.

'No, you don't understand,' the Knichgt said, looking a little vexed. 'That's what the name is called. The name really is "The Aged Aged Man".”
― Dennis Duncan, Index, A History of the: A Bookish Adventure from Medieval Manuscripts to the Digital Age

“Naming is a form of power. It cements a commitment to the subject of your expertise and, in the case of nature, often an ancestral continuity, too. Naming is an assertion of meaning, and in turn it creates meaning. It allows us to greet the things we know like old friends.”
― Katherine May, Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age

“The words of gods and men are names of things
And thoughts accustom'd : but of things unknown
And unimagin'd are no words at all.”
― Robert Bridges, Demeter: A Mask

“Once people have a name for something, their tendency is to think they understand it and once they think they understand it, they quit experiencing it fresh and new each time they encounter it. Should the name itself be inaccurate it starts a chain of cultural and individual events that lead to outcomes that are not predictable in the initial act of naming.”
― Stephen Harrod Buhner, The Secret Teachings of Plants: The Intelligence of the Heart in the Direct Perception of Nature

“To write means renaming the space around you, describing it as if it were something else.”
― Mónica Ojeda, Nefando

“Your name will call you forward without compromise or second-guessing. (p. xii)”
― Melanie DewBerry, The Power of Naming: A Journey toward Your Soul's Indigenous Nature

“Look at them leaving in droves, the children of the land, just look at them leaving in droves. Those with nothing are crossing boarders. Those with strength are crossing boarders. Those with ambitions are crossing boarders. Those with hopes are crossing boarders. Those with loss are crossing boarders. Those in pain are crossing boarders. Moving, running, emigrating, going, deserting, walking, quitting, flying, fleeing --- to all over, to countries unheard of, to countries whose names they cannot pronounce. They are leaving in droves.”
― nonviolet bulowayo

“Kader", people called it --'destiny -- and said not more because people always gave simple names to the complex things that frightened them”
― Elif Şafak, 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World

“Aren't you a cutie," Evie said, picking up the fawn-colored dog. His dominant breed was clearly pug, but he was mixed with something else.
"Hey, Odessa, any idea what the pug is mixed with? Looks like maybe a beagle?" Evie called.
"That's what Doc thinks he's mixed with too," Odessa answered as she came into the room. "He was surrendered by his owner last week. The guy got him from a breeder as a gift for his girlfriend, but she wanted a miniature purebred pug and the breeder wouldn't give him a refund." She rubbed the dog behind the ear. "This one is a sweetie."
"Does he have a name?" Evie asked.
"He didn't come with one. He looks like an Oliver to me. Or maybe a Sam."
"You know I hate when dogs have people names," Evie said. As she scratched the top of his head, she took in his coloring. His light brown coat reminded her of Butterball, the Pomeranian she'd rescued in the eighth grade. But the dark brown face and ears were hallmarks of a pug.
"This brown spot on the top of his head is pretty unique," Evie said. "What if we call him Waffles?"
Odessa plopped a hand on her hip. "So you'd rather name a dog after breakfast than after one of the greatest singers of all time, Sam Cooke?"
"No offense to Sam Cooke, but Waffles is the perfect name for this cutie." Evie pointed to him. "Check out the shape of the dark brown spot on his head. It looks like a splash of syrup.
"You're a cute little stack of waffles, aren't you?" She rubbed her nose to his as she continued the head scratch.”
― Farrah Rochon, Pugs and Kisses

“You said it without anger or derision. When you looked at me and didn’t see an assassin or an enemy. You saw me and said ‘Ethan.”
― L.J. Hayward, When Death Frees the Devil

“It was like naming a baby: the title fitted for a while, then didn't, the creation outgrowing her meager definition.”
― Stephanie Bishop, The Other Side of the World