Non-Indicative Name/Literature

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Examples of Non-Indicative Names in Literature include:

Books

  • L. M. Montogomery's A Tangled Web featured Little Peter and Big Peter. Unfortunately, they were named as children, and Little Peter is the younger by ten years. Now that he is a foot taller, the names are stuck.
  • In The Riftwar Cycle, not only is Macros the Black Sorcerer not a villain, but he wears brown robes, in contrast to most other wizards in the series. Justified as his name was part of a series of tales designed to keep people from approaching his island home base (which he could deal with but would be a hassle), and for that matter most Midkemian magicians didn't wear black (though the Great Ones of Kelewan did), so it was more unique.
  • Dante's Divine Comedy uses the old definition of "comedy", meaning a story with a happy ending - at the end, Dante visits Heaven and meets God. The word "Divine" is an example, being a comment meaning inspired by God on the merit of the work; Dante originally just called it Comedy, and Boccaccio added the adjective.
  • Monty Python's Big Red Book has a blue cover.
  • The opening sentence of Salman Rushdie's Luka and the Fire of Life reads: "There was once, in the city of Kahani, in the land of Alifbay, a boy named Luka who had two pets, a bear named Dog and a dog named Bear, which meant that whenever he called out, "Dog!" the bear waddled up amiably on his hind legs, and when he shouted, "Bear!" the dog bounded toward him, wagging his tail."
  • First Among Sequels in the Thursday Next series is the third among sequels in numeration and the fourth book. Well, it's also the fourth sequel, but the internal third sequel never existed because of the events of the fourth book.
  • In the Odd Thomas series by Dean Koontz, Little Ozzie is larger than his father, Big Ozzie.
    • In Odd Hours, Odd mentions how the streets in Magic Beach all have non-indicative names. Jacaranda Avenue has no jacaranda trees, Sterling Heights is the town's poorest neighborhood, Ocean Avenue is the farthest street from the ocean, Memorial Park Avenue doesn't have a memorial park on it, and so on.
    • There is a (probably) Older Than Radio riddle that inquires who is largest among Mr. Bigger, Mrs. Bigger and their child. Answer: The child, because he is a little Bigger.
  • Tock in the The Phantom Tollbooth is a watchdog who could only go "tick". His brother, named Tick, could only go "tock". His family is very sensitive about this.
  • The Da Vinci Code has nothing to do with the town of Vinci; "Da Vinci" was not Leonardo's last name, but his birth-place (i.e., "of Vinci"). The eponymous code was made and hidden by Leonardo da Vinci, though.
  • Flann O'Brien loved doing this: The tiny Shannon River islet of Swim-two-Birds is mentioned exactly once in passing in "At Swim-Two-Birds".
  • The Princess Bride isn't technically a princess: Buttercup was the daughter of a dairy farmer, but as she was almost inhumanly beautiful, Prince Humperdinck had insisted on her being his bride. His advisors were troubled by the idea of him marrying a non-royal, and quietly arranged for her to be known as the Princess of Hammersmith (a tiny portion of the realm) and shipped her off to royalty school for training. The film of the novel makes no attempt to hide the fact that she was born a commoner.
  • The title of The Neverending Story doesn't refer to the book itself, but describes mankind's imagination.
  • The Analects of Confucius aren't analects, and the Master's name wasn't really Confucius either.
  • Sword of Truth:
    • A "death spell" makes people think someone is dead.
    • The "maternity" spell creates one-way Synchronization between the caster and the target, essentially making them a hostage to the caster's well being.
    • To a degree, the Confessors are people who brainwash people into being their slaves. They're called that because they're supposed to use the ability to make people confess to their crimes, but in the series it's mostly just used to enslave people's minds.
  • A halfway example in The Dresden Files with the Corpsetaker: while as a necromancer she could be considered someone who takes corpses, she is mostly known for body swapping. Her Latin name of Capiocorpus would be more accurately translated as "body taker" - between that and Harry's command of Latin, it's possible he just translated it wrong and no one bothered to correct him.
  • Lampshaded in the very first line of The Westing Game, in which Sunset Towers is an apartment building that faces east (sunrise), not west, and has no towers either.
  • The Three Musketeers is somewhat of a misleading title, as it refers to Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, who are actually co-stars to d'Artagnan, the true protagonist.
  • Frank Herbert's Dune:
    • The Water of Life is a deadly poison to most people, with its use resulting in Nightmare Fuel. Even more, it is made by drowning a baby sandworm, which then regurgitates the substance. The only way to use it is to have a Bene Gesserit drink some and convert it to a safe narcotic substance.
    • The Butler family are in no way servants to anyone, as lampshaded by Quentin Butler (who married into the name).
    • Likewise, the Butlerian Jihad has nothing to do with any Muslims or any spiritual journey. The actual Buddislamics wanted nothing to do with the war - it was declared by people worshiping the Orange Catholic Bible.
    • Sand trout are tiny slugs that do not even remotely resemble a fish.
    • The no-ship and no-chamber seem like examples of this - the idea is that they exist in "no-space," where the Guild can't see them with their powers, so the names are sensible, if a bit circuitous.
  • The eponymous planet of Stanislaw Lem's novel, Eden, was named from how it looked from a distance. It proved to be a distinctly ironic name after the heroes make an emergency landing on it.
  • The novel Breaking Smith's Quarterhorse would seem, from the title, to mostly revolve around a man named Smith, who has a quarterhorse in need of breaking. Smith is referred to in one line; the horse doesn't even get that. The book is actually about... not much, really.
  • Tennessee Williams was from Mississippi.
  • One of Isaac Asimov's earliest published stories was titled The Weapon Too Dreadful To Use. As you've no doubt already guessed, the weapon is in fact used. Asimov later noted that having this disconnect pointed out to him soured him on using grandiose titles.
  • The Incredibly Deadly Viper in A Series of Unfortunate Events is one of the least deadly creatures in the animal kingdom. Uncle Monty named it that to play a joke on the Herpetological Society.
  • The Perfectly Normal Beast in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: it is actually fairly normal, except that it only appears on the planet Lamuella in a stampede from one invisible space warp to another. It was named to reassure residents, but Trillian at least finds the name suspicious instantly.
  • Harry Harrison's Death World:
    • In Death World 3, the planet Felicity (meaning "bliss" or "happiness") does indeed contain rich mineral resources (if that is your idea of bliss), but it was named before the galactic community realized that it's also populated with hordes of nomadic barbarians who absolutely hate permanent structures and will kill anyone who isn't a nomad. That also includes mining equipment.
    • Also, the title of Return to Deathworld (co-authored by Ant Skalandis and never published in English) is misleading, in that no one has actually left Deathworld to return to it.
  • In Sergey Lukyanenko's The Last Watch, Merlin's ultimate artifact is called the Crown of All. It's not a crown or anything even remotely close.
  • In the Discworld book Lords and Ladies, mention is made of the Carter family, who named their daughters after virtues and their sons after vices. They turned out to be non-indicative: Charity Carter grew up to be greedy and Prudence Carter wound up the mother of fourteen kids, while Anger Carter is known for being even-tempered, and Bestiality Carter is known for being kind to animals.
  • The Star Wars Expanded Universe novel have as many examples as the films - in addition to those mentioned already in the film section above, there's also the Sun Crusher, which doesn't crush suns but instead forces them to go supernova and rip apart in a violent explosion.
  • Arthur Phillips' 2003 novel Prague takes place entirely in Budapest = the characters think everything is happening in Prague and talk about it, but never go there.

Periodicals

  • You would think that a magazine named Garden & Gun would be perfect for that firearms enthusiasts with a nurturing side, but it's really about Southern fine dining and high culture.
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