THE HERMENEUTIC POWER OF CHARACTONYMS: A CASE STUDY

Abstract

The aim of the article is to analyze the symbolic meaning of the name of Havelock Vetinari, one of the most recurrent literary characters in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series. The focus of the discussion are the literary and historical associations embedded in his name and his titles, which help the informed reader comprehend the complexity of the character’s behavior in the narratives. The intertextual appropriations and echoes at the heart of the name derive from the author’s multilayered encyclopedic knowledge that underlies the coining of the character’s name. Havelock Vetinari is a noteworthy example of how the invented name of a literary character can become a powerful tool for meaning making in literature. The study is carried out within the theoretical framework of the hermeneutic approach according to which a whole is understood as the synthesis of the numerous parts it consists of and the multifaceted interrelations among them. The analysis of Vetinari’s name is thus conducted as a process of engaging in turn with the meaning of his given name, his family name as well as his official titles of address and nicknames, and looking into the linguistic, historical, and cultural associations they evoke which are correspondent to the nature of the literary character.