How popular is the baby name Igor in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Use the popularity graph and data table below to find out! Plus, see all the blog posts that mention the name Igor.

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Popularity of the baby name Igor


Posts that mention the name Igor

Popular baby names in Ireland, 2023

Flag of Ireland
Flag of Ireland

Last year, the Republic of Ireland — which covers five-sixths of the island of Ireland — welcomed roughly 55,000 babies.

What were the most popular names among these babies? Grace and Jack.

Here are Ireland’s top 50 girl names and top 50 boy names of 2023:

Girl Names

  1. Grace, 339 baby girls
  2. Fiadh (pronounced FEE-a), 300
  3. Emily, 297
  4. Sophie, 283
  5. Lily, 270
  6. Ellie, 252
  7. Mia, 242
  8. Amelia, 241 (tie)
  9. Éabha (pronounced EY-va), 241 (tie)
  10. Ella, 231
  11. Isla, 227
  12. Hannah, 226
  13. Sophia, 218
  14. Lucy, 214
  15. Ava, 207
  16. Sadie, 200
  17. Olivia, 199
  18. Freya, 188
  19. Emma, 183
  20. Chloe, 181
  21. Robyn, 180
  22. Molly, 176
  23. Anna, 166 (tie)
  24. Croía (pronounced KREE-a), 166 (tie)
  25. Evie, 165
  26. Caoimhe (pronounced KEE-va or KWEE-va), 158
  27. Saoirse (pronounced SEER-sha or SAYR-sha), 157 (tie)
  28. Cara, 157 (tie)
  29. Sofia, 156
  30. Millie, 150
  31. Aoife (pronounced EE-fa), 148
  32. Isabelle, 132
  33. Bonnie, 130
  34. Maya, 128 (tie)
  35. Ada, 128 (tie)
  36. Róisín (pronounced ROH-sheen), 127
  37. Ruby, 126
  38. Kate, 123 (tie)
  39. Alice, 123 (tie)
  40. Holly, 120 (3-way tie)
  41. Erin, 120 (3-way tie)
  42. Sadhbh (pronounced siev; rhymes with “5”), 120 (3-way tie)
  43. Leah, 119
  44. Isabella, 118 (3-way tie)
  45. Ailbhe (pronounced AL-va), 118 (3-way tie)
  46. Méabh (pronounced mayv), 118 (3-way tie)
  47. Zoe, 115
  48. Annie, 112
  49. Ivy, 111
  50. Willow, 110

Boy Names

  1. Jack, 561 baby boys
  2. Noah, 473
  3. James, 369
  4. Rían (pronounced REE-an), 339
  5. Oisín (pronounced UH-sheen or OH-sheen), 330
  6. Fionn (pronounced fyun or fyoon), 306
  7. Tadhg (pronounced tieg, like the first part of “tiger”), 301
  8. Liam, 289
  9. Cillian (pronounced KIL-ee-an), 275
  10. Daniel, 256
  11. Finn, 251
  12. Conor, 244 (tie)
  13. Charlie, 244 (tie)
  14. Seán (pronounced shawn), 240
  15. Michael, 239
  16. Leo, 237
  17. Theo, 233
  18. Thomas, 227
  19. Patrick, 221
  20. Luke, 215
  21. Tommy, 214
  22. Oliver, 211
  23. Adam, 201
  24. Harry, 198
  25. Luca, 197
  26. Darragh, 195
  27. Alex, 175
  28. Bobby, 157
  29. Cian (pronounced KEE-an or keen), 156
  30. Oscar, 154
  31. John, 152 (tie)
  32. Max, 152 (tie)
  33. Ryan, 151
  34. Páidí (pronounced PAW-dee), 150
  35. Jamie, 149
  36. Ben, 147
  37. Kai, 141 (tie)
  38. Ollie, 141 (tie)
  39. Tom, 135
  40. Matthew, 134
  41. Dylan, 132
  42. Callum, 131
  43. Sonny, 130
  44. Sam, 129
  45. Ethan, 127 (tie)
  46. Alfie, 127 (tie)
  47. David, 122
  48. Alexander, 118
  49. Mason, 116
  50. Caelan, 114

New to the girls’ top 100 were Lucia, Cadhla (pronounced KIE-la) and Síofra (pronounced SHEE-fra).

New to the boys’ top 100 were Caelan, Jude, Paddy, Éanna (pronounced EY-na) and Dáithí (pronounced DAH-hee).

The fastest-rising names in the top 100 in terms of numbers of babies were:

  • Éala (increased by 41 baby girls), Ailbhe (+40), Méabh (+36), Zara (+33), Croía (+26)
  • Caelan (increased by 58 baby boys), Páidí (+41), Arlo (+35), Tommy (+30), Mark (+28)

And the fastest-rising names in terms of rank were:

  • Síofra (rose 57 spots on the girls’ list), Lucia (+43), Éala (+38), Lottie (+36), Zara (+31)
  • Caelan (rose 58 spots on the boys’ list), Mark (+46), Ruairí (+41), Eoin (+37), Arlo (+31)
Map of the four provinces of Ireland
Ireland’s four provinces

Home to more than five million people, the Republic of Ireland is divided into four provinces. (One of these provinces, Ulster, lies largely within Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK.) The top baby names within each of the four provinces last year were…

Top Girl NameTop Boy Name
Leinster
(56% of the population)
GraceJack
Munster
(27% of pop.)
GraceJack
Connacht
(11% of pop.)
FiadhJack
Ulster [ROI portion]
(6% of pop.)
LilyJack

And what about the baby names at the other end of the spectrum?

Here’s a selection of the names that were given to just 3 babies each in Ireland last year:

Rare Girl NamesRare Boy Names
Adara, Brídín, Cushla, Dottie, Eilidh, Féile, Gillian, Hezlin, Iona, Jolene, Kalina, Lorna, Maliha, Natasha, Ocean, Philomena, Ríonach, Saffie, Tuiren, Vedika, Yasmine, ZadieAlby, Bram, Conal, Douglas, Elvis, Finnian, Gerald, Igor, Jonnie, Keenan, Lughaidh, Maitiú, Nathanael, Orin, Patryk, Rylan, Séadhna, Téidí, Ultán, Viktor, Wren, Yohan, Zachariah

Finally, here are Ireland’s 2022 rankings, if you’d like to compare last year to the year before.

Sources: Irish Babies’ Names – CSO (Irish Babies’ Names 2023), Births, Deaths and Marriages – CSO, Provinces of Ireland – Wikipedia

Image: Adapted from Flag of Ireland (public domain)
Map: Adapted from Provinces of Ireland location map by Ssolbergj under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Popular baby names in Northern Ireland (UK), 2022

Flag of the United Kingdom
Flag of the United Kingdom

Northern Ireland may be located on the island of Ireland, but it’s been part of the United Kingdom (along with Scotland, England, and Wales — all of which are located on the next-door island of Great Britain) since 1921.

Last year, Northern Ireland welcomed 20,929 babies — 10,242 girls and 10,687 boys.

What were the most popular names among these babies? Grace and James.

Here are the Northern Ireland’s top 50+ girl names and top 50 boy names of 2022:

Girl Names

  1. Grace, 168 baby girls
  2. Emily, 152
  3. Fiadh, 148 – pronounced FEE-a
  4. Olivia, 141
  5. Isla, 118
  6. Aoife, 113 – pronounced EE-fa
  7. Lily, 110
  8. Annie, 97
  9. Evie, 94 (tie)
  10. Freya, 94 (tie)
  11. Amelia, 91
  12. Ella, 88
  13. Charlotte, 87
  14. Ava, 84 (tie)
  15. Sophia, 84 (tie)
  16. Anna, 80 (tie)
  17. Erin, 80 (tie)
  18. Eabha, 74 – pronounced EY-va
  19. Katie, 72 (tie)
  20. Ruby, 72 (tie)
  21. Maisie, 71 (tie)
  22. Sophie, 71 (tie)
  23. Lucy, 70
  24. Ellie, 69
  25. Aria, 65
  26. Niamh, 64 – pronounced neev or NEE-iv
  27. Molly, 59 (tie)
  28. Rosie, 59 (tie)
  29. Clodagh, 57 (tie) – pronounced KLOH-da
  30. Mia, 57 (tie)
  31. Hannah, 56
  32. Meabh, 55 (tie) – pronounced mayv
  33. Willow, 55 (tie)
  34. Elsie, 54
  35. Cora, 52 (tie)
  36. Phoebe, 52 (tie)
  37. Ada, 51
  38. Bonnie, 49 (tie)
  39. Isabella, 49 (tie)
  40. Eva, 48 (4-way tie)
  41. Georgia, 48 (4-way tie)
  42. Ivy, 48 (4-way tie)
  43. Sadie, 48 (4-way tie)
  44. Cara, 47 (tie)
  45. Harper, 47 (tie)
  46. Emma, 46 (tie)
  47. Zara, 46 (tie)
  48. Chloe, 45 (tie)
  49. Rose, 45 (tie)
  50. Poppy, 44 (tie)
  51. Saoirse, 44 (tie) – pronounced SEER-sha or SAYR-sha

Boy Names

  1. James, 175 baby boys
  2. Jack, 169
  3. Noah, 146
  4. Theo, 132
  5. Charlie, 131
  6. Oliver, 123
  7. Oisin, 119 – pronounced UH-sheen or OH-sheen
  8. Harry, 118
  9. Cillian, 111 – pronounced KIL-ee-an
  10. Thomas, 107
  11. Leo, 106
  12. Finn, 98
  13. Tommy, 97
  14. Daniel, 90
  15. Alfie, 87
  16. Luca, 83
  17. Freddie, 81
  18. Arthur, 80
  19. Jacob, 79
  20. Jude, 77
  21. Luke, 74 (tie)
  22. Ollie, 74 (tie)
  23. Caleb, 72 (tie)
  24. Ronan, 72 (tie)
  25. Ethan, 69
  26. Darragh, 67
  27. Shea, 65
  28. Rory, 64
  29. Archie, 63 (tie)
  30. Joshua, 63 (tie)
  31. Adam, 62 (3-way tie)
  32. Jonah, 62 (3-way tie)
  33. Matthew, 62 (3-way tie)
  34. Daithi, 61 – pronounced DAH-hee
  35. Ezra, 60 (3-way tie)
  36. Michael, 60 (3-way tie)
  37. Odhran, 60 (3-way tie) – pronounced OH-rawn
  38. George, 59
  39. Reuben, 58
  40. Henry, 57 (4-way tie)
  41. Isaac, 57 (4-way tie)
  42. Logan, 57 (4-way tie)
  43. Teddy, 57 (4-way tie)
  44. Jake, 55 (tie)
  45. Max, 55 (tie)
  46. Mason, 54
  47. Alexander, 53
  48. Conan, 52 (3-way tie)
  49. Conor, 52 (3-way tie)
  50. Joseph, 52 (3-way tie)

The fastest-rising names in the girls’ top 100 were Pippa, Nevaeh, Lucia, Croia, and Maeve.

The fastest-rising names in the boy’s top 100 were Hugo, Luca, Hudson, Rian, and Nathan.

Northern Ireland’s data technically only goes down to names given to 3 babies, but it also includes all the other names — they just aren’t labeled with a “2” or a “1.” In the data for 2020 and 2021, these rare names were separated into two alphabetized lists, so I could guess which list contained the single-use names. In the data for 2022, however, the double- and single-use names were mixed together. So, this time around, I can only offer you a selection of the country’s uncommon (as opposed to unique) baby names:

Rare Girl NamesRare Boy Names
Aeza, Banba/Banbha, Brilliana, Cobhlaith, Della, Eilish, Faoiltiarna, Glencia, Hetty, Israella, Jersey, Kevia, Lilium, Marcy, Neansai, Orlaithi, Prim, Rhaenyra, Simona, Tiggy, Una, Yvonne, ZuzuAlvie, Bonyo, Caolach, Dubhaltach, Evenezer, Fazza, Ghyth, Hamish, Igor, Jivko, Kylian, Lughaidh, Maui, Norrin, Olcan, Plunkett, Rupert, Selkie, Tuathal, Ugnius, Vivaan, Windsor, Yaurik, Zeki

Some explanations/associations for a few of the above…

  • Banba – a goddess in Irish mythology.
    • Banbha – the modern spelling of Banba.
  • Faoiltiarna – an Irish name made up of the elements faol, “wolf,” and tighearna, “lord.”
  • Olcan – a 5th-century Irish saint associated with the village of Armoy in County Antrim.
  • Rhaenyra – a character from the TV series House of the Dragon (a prequel to Game of Thrones).
  • Selkie – a seal/human shapeshifter in Celtic (as well as Norse) mythology.

Finally, let’s take a look at middle names. About 86% of the girls and 89% of the boys born in Northern Ireland last year were given at least one middle name. The middles chosen most often were…

  • Rose, Grace, Elizabeth, Mary, and Marie (for girls), and
  • James, John, Patrick, Michael, and Thomas (for boys).

P.S. If you’re interested in seeing more Irish name pronunciations, just click that link.

Sources: Baby Names 2022 | Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency, Northern Ireland – Wikipedia, Faoiltiarna – Oxford Reference

Image: Adapted from Flag of the United Kingdom (public domain)

Popular baby names in Poland, 2022

Flag of Poland
Flag of Poland

The country of Poland is located in Central Europe and shares a border with seven other countries (including Russia, Germany, and Slovakia).

Last year, Poland welcomed approximately 305,000 babies — 290,000 of which were born to Polish parents and 15,000 of which were born to non-Polish parents (many of them Ukrainian refugees).

What were the most popular names among all these babies? Zofia and Antoni.

Here are Poland’s top 50 girl names and top 50+ boy names of 2022:

Girl Names

  1. Zofia, 5,714 baby girls
  2. Zuzanna, 5,558
  3. Hanna, 5,261
  4. Laura, 5,095
  5. Maja, 4,979
  6. Julia, 4,936
  7. Oliwia, 4,440
  8. Alicja, 4,261
  9. Pola, 4,087
  10. Lena, 3,811
  11. Maria, 3,732
  12. Emilia, 3,188
  13. Amelia, 3,143
  14. Antonina,3,133
  15. Wiktoria, 3,037
  16. Liliana, 2,860
  17. Iga, 2,847 – a diminutive of either Jadwiga or Ignacja
  18. Michalina, 2,749
  19. Marcelina, 2,720
  20. Helena, 2,680
  21. Klara, 2,523
  22. Aleksandra, 2,370
  23. Gabriela, 2,220
  24. Anna, 1,965
  25. Kornelia, 1,927
  26. Lucja, 1,862
  27. Blanka, 1,853
  28. Nela, 1,840
  29. Nadia, 1,792
  30. Natalia, 1,734
  31. Jagoda, 1,554
  32. Lilianna, 1,472
  33. Milena, 1,467
  34. Anastazja, 1,297
  35. Mia, 1,217
  36. Kaja, 1,213
  37. Nikola, 1,109
  38. Nina, 1,102
  39. Weronika, 1,081
  40. Róza, 1,074
  41. Rozalia, 1,072
  42. Aniela, 1,039
  43. Sara, 998
  44. Barbara, 993
  45. Matylda, 968
  46. Karolina, 887
  47. Martyna, 840
  48. Liwia, 821
  49. Agata, 811
  50. Eliza, 756

Boy Names

  1. Antoni, 6,670 baby boys
  2. Jan, 6,341
  3. Aleksander, 6,201
  4. Nikodem, 6,155
  5. Franciszek, 5,696
  6. Jakub, 5,535
  7. Leon, 5,091
  8. Mikolaj, 4,499
  9. Stanislaw, 4,265
  10. Filip, 4,107
  11. Ignacy, 4,086
  12. Szymon, 4,069
  13. Wojciech, 3,539
  14. Adam, 3,348
  15. Kacper, 3,251
  16. Tymon, 3,164
  17. Marcel, 3,081
  18. Maksymilian, 3,055
  19. Michal, 2,758
  20. Wiktor, 2,709
  21. Oliwier, 2,551
  22. Tymoteusz, 2,278
  23. Milosz, 2,234
  24. Igor, 2,226
  25. Julian, 2,040
  26. Piotr, 1,987
  27. Oskar, 1,932
  28. Gabriel, 1,712
  29. Dawid, 1,489
  30. Krzysztof, 1,352
  31. Bartosz, 1,315
  32. Dominik, 1,271
  33. Natan, 1,222
  34. Bruno, 1,214
  35. Mateusz, 1,209
  36. Hubert, 1,152
  37. Karol, 1,141
  38. Alan, 1,058
  39. Fabian, 1,014
  40. Tomasz, 977
  41. Maciej, 975
  42. Henryk, 948
  43. Cezary, 892 (tie)
  44. Tadeusz, 892 (tie)
  45. Artur, 858
  46. Ksawery, 849 – a form of Xavier
  47. Pawel, 753
  48. Milan, 727
  49. Daniel, 717
  50. Kazimierz, 674 (tie)
  51. Kuba, 674 (tie)

(Because L‘s with a stroke don’t render properly on my site, you’ll have to imagine they exist in several of the above: the girl name Lucja and the boy names Mikolaj, Stanislaw, Michal, Milosz, and Pawel.)

Poland’s data goes all the way down to names with just two instances of usage, so here’s a sampling of the rare baby names at the opposite end of the spectrum:

Rare Girl NamesRare Boy Names
Aglaja, Beyza, Celestyna, Dasza, Esenia, Freyja, Harper, Illia, Jaga, Koralia, Lilibet, Melanija, Nurana, Oktavia, Penelope, Radochna, Sviatoslava, Tekla, Ustina, Vasylisa, Yeseniya, ZytaAffan, Bronislav, Caspian, Demjan, Elisey, Florin, Gajusz, Henrik, Igo, Jarogniew, Klimek, Lian, Matwej, Neo, Przemek, Rishi, Salwador, Timo, Vadzim, Witosz, Yuri, Zorian

The two Lilibets were likely named with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s daughter Lilibet Diana (b. 2021) in mind.

Finally, here are Poland’s 2021 rankings, if you’d like to compare last year to the year before.

Sources: Imiona nadawane dzieciom w Polsce – Otwarte Dane, Poland’s birth rate in decline shows study – The First News, Behind the Name

Image: Adapted from Flag of Poland (public domain)

Quotes about the names of writers

Irish playwright and poet Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)
Oscar Wilde

From the 2000 book Oscar Wilde: A Certain Genius by Barbara Belford:

“How ridiculous of you to suppose that anyone, least of all my dear mother, would christen me ‘plain Oscar,'” Wilde later said. “When one is unknown, a number of Christian names are useful, perhaps needful. As one becomes famous, one sheds some of them…I started as Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde. All but two of the five names have already been thrown overboard. Soon I shall discard another and be known simply as ‘The Wilde’ or ‘The Oscar.'”

From a 2008 article by writer Ta-Nehisi Coates (b. 1975) in The Atlantic:

[F]or the record Ta-Nehisi (pronounced Tah-Nuh-Hah-See) is an Egyptian name for ancient Nubia. I came up in a time when African/Arabic names were just becoming popular among black parents. I had a lot of buddies named Kwame, Kofi, Malik (actually have a brother with that name), Akilah and Aisha. My Dad had to be different, though. Couldn’t just give me a run of the mill African name. I had to be a nation.

From a 2019 article about names by journalist Josanne Cassar in Malta Today:

In my case it can be mildly tiring because I am constantly having to explain that there is no “i” in Josanne, (simply because the most common spelling and pronunciation is Josianne) – one person had even asked me if I was sure I was spelling it right and asked me to check my own ID card. True story.

From the post “My name is not really Penelope” by blogger Penelope Trunk:

So when I signed up for my son’s preschool, I told them my name was Penelope Trunk. My husband had a fit. He told me I was starting our new life in Madison as an insane person and I cannot change my name now.

But I explained to him that it would be insane not to change my name now. I am way better known as Penelope than Adrienne. And my career is so closely tied with the brand Penelope Trunk, that I actually became the brand. So calling myself Penelope Trunk instead of Adrienne Greenheart is actually a way to match my personal life with my professional life and to make things more sane.

At first it was a little weird. For example, we were driving in the car one day and my son said, “Mom, who’s Penelope Trunk?”

But now it feels good to be Penelope Trunk. No more having to figure out what name to give where. No more pretending to be someone, sometimes. No more long explanations and short memories of who calls me what.

From the 2005 speech “How Everything Turns Away” by children’s book author Lois Lowry (b. 1937):

My first photograph…or the first photograph of me…was taken, by my father, when I was 36 hours old. My name was different then. They had named me Sena, for my Norwegian grandmother, and that was my name until she was notified; then she sent a telegram insisting that they give me an American name, and so I was renamed Lois Ann for my father’s two sisters.

American memoirist Maya Angelou (1928-2014)
Maya Angelou (who was a dancer in the 1950s!)

From the book Maya Angelou (2009) by Harold Bloom:

From that local bar she moves on to the Purple Onion, one of the most popular nightclubs on the entire West Coast. It is here that she is encouraged to replace the “s” in her last name with a “u”. She will now also need an exotic first name. This is when she remembered, “My brother has always called me Maya. For ‘Marguerite.’ He used to call me ‘My sister,’ then he called me ‘My,’ and finally, ‘Maya’.” Marguerite Johnson Angelos becomes Maya Angelou, and shortly thereafter she has more job offers than she is able to accommodate.

From the about page of writer Tsh Oxenreider:

My name is Tsh Oxenreider, and no, my name is not a typo (one of the first things people ask). It’s pronounced “Tish.” No reason, really, except that my parents were experimental with their names choices in the 70s. Until my younger brother was born in the 80s, whom they named Josh, quite possibly one of the most common names for people his age. Who knows what they were thinking, really.

From the about page of “Robert Galbraith,” pseudonym of writer J. K. Rowling:

I can only hope all the real Robert Galbraiths out there will be as forgiving as the real Harry Potters have been. I must say, I don’t think their plight is quite as embarrassing.

I chose Robert because it is one of my favourite men’s names, because Robert F Kennedy is my hero and because, mercifully, I hadn’t used it for any of the characters in the Potter series or ‘The Casual Vacancy’.

Galbraith came about for a slightly odd reason. When I was a child, I really wanted to be called ‘Ella Galbraith’, and I’ve no idea why. I don’t even know how I knew that the surname existed, because I can’t remember ever meeting anyone with it. Be that as it may, the name had a fascination for me. I actually considered calling myself L A Galbraith for the Strike series, but for fairly obvious reasons decided that initials were a bad idea.

Odder still, there was a well-known economist called J K Galbraith, something I only remembered by the time it was far too late. I was completely paranoid that people might take this as a clue and land at my real identity, but thankfully nobody was looking that deeply at the author’s name.

From an 2009 New York Times article about Lara Prescott, author of The Secrets We Kept, a fictional account of the dangers of publishing Doctor Zhivago in the 1950s:

You could say she was born to write this historical novel: Prescott’s mother named her after the doomed heroine from her favorite movie, the 1965 adaptation of Boris Pasternak’s epic.

(The movie made the baby name Lara quite trendy during the second half of the 1960s, in fact.)

From a 2003 interview with Jhumpa Lahiri in the New York Times:

JG: In the new book, you explain that all Bengalis have private pet names and public “good names.” But the main character in “The Namesake” is given only one name: Gogol, after the Russian writer.

JL: That happened to me. My name, Jhumpa, which is my only name now, was supposed to be my pet name. My parents tried to enroll me in school under my good name, but the teacher asked if they had anything shorter. Even now, people in India ask why I’m publishing under my pet name instead of a real name.

JG: What does Jhumpa mean?

JL: Jhumpa has no meaning. It always upset me. It’s like jhuma, which refers to the sound of a child’s rattle, but with a “p.” In this country, you’d never name your child Rattle. I actually have two good names, Nilanjana and Sudeshna. My mother couldn’t decide. All three are on the birth certificate. I never knew how to write my name.

From a 2020 lecture on creative writing given by author Brandon Sanderson [vid], an aside about the name Brandon:

When I grew up in Nebraska, I was the only Brandon, like, in my school. It was a really original, interesting name. I’m like, ‘My parents came up with this great, original, interesting name.’ And then I moved to Utah to go to BYU and there were five in my freshman dorm. And then I realized: It’s a Mormon name! Who would have thought? It’s not in any of the scriptures but it totally is a Mormon name. There’s a ton. Brandon Flowers, right? Brandon Mull, Brandon Sanderson. There’s a lot of Brandons out there with an LDS background. Who knew?

(Brandon Flowers is the lead singer of The Killers, while Brandon Mull — like Sanderson — writes fantasy. Brandon Sanderson is behind the debuts of the baby names Kaladin and Sylphrena, btw.)

From the book A Life Observed: A Spiritual Biography of C. S. Lewis (2013) by Devin Brown:

Although born and baptized as Clive [Staples Lewis], Lewis soon took a disliking to the name his parents had given him. Sometime around the age of four, he marched up to his mother and, pointing at himself, declared that he was now to be known as “Jacksie.” This name, later shortened to Jacks and then to just Jack, became the only name he would answer to. In his book Jack’s Life, Douglas Gresham, Lewis’s stepson, provides the following background on why Lewis chose this name: ‘It was actually because of a small dog that he was fond of that he picked the name Jacksie, which was what the dog was called. It was run over (probably by a horse and cart as there were almost no cars in the time and place where he was a child), and Jack, as he later became known just took the name for himself.’

From a 2014 article by journalist Kerry Parnell in The Daily Telegraph:

[W]hen I was born and my parents proudly announced my name to the family, my great-grandma was disgusted and informed them Kerry was a dog’s name.

She never wavered from this conviction until one day, when I was about five, we visited her to see her new poodle puppy.

“What’s his name?” I asked. “Kerry,” she replied, stony faced. There was a long, awkward silence and no one ever mentioned it again.

Ironically, great-grandma went by the name of “Pete”, which, unless I am very much mistaken, is a man’s name.

One day, I vow, I will get a dog just so I can call it Pete, for revenge.

From the book Germaine Greer: Untamed Shrew (1997) by Christine Wallace:

In the autumn of 1938 came the first conception. Peggy’s pregnancy was easy, with little more than queasiness. But the labor was long and difficult. The baby, a girl, was bruised around the head from the traumatic delivery and arrived in floods of blood as Peggy hemorrhaged from a retained placenta. The baby was named Germaine, with no middle initial to interrupt the elegant alliteration with Greer. According to Peggy, it was the name of a minor British actress she found in an English magazine Reg had brought home from work. In Germaine’s version, her mother was reading George Sand’s The Countess of Rudolstadt when she fell pregnant, and drew the name from one of its characters, the Comte de Saint-Germain — ‘because she liked the sound of it, I reckon.’ It was the height of the last Australian summer before the war: 29 January 1939.

From the book Here at The New Yorker (1975) by Brendan Gill:

Indeed, there are writers remembered not for their novels but for their names: Mazo de la Roche, Ouida, Warwick Deeping.

From a 2006 article about poet Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) in NYC newspaper The Villager:

There is hardly an account of Greenwich Village in the ’20s in which she does not prominently figure. Yet her roots in the neighborhood preceded even her fame. The poet’s unusual middle name came from St. Vincent’s Hospital on 12th St. Millay’s uncle was nursed back to health there after a sailing accident, and her mother wished to show her gratitude by naming her first-born child after the place.

And another about Millay from What Lips My Lips Have Kissed: The Loves and Love Poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay (2001) by Daniel Mark Epstein:

She preferred the triumphant-sounding title to plain “Edna” (Hebrew for “rejuvenation”) and asked to be called “Vincent,” which somehow rubbed the school principal, Frank Wilbur, the wrong way. He made sport of calling her by any woman’s name beginning with a V: Vanessa, Viola, Vivian, anything but Vincent. “Yes, yes, Mr. Wilbur,” she would answer, with weary patience, “but my name is Vincent.”

From Duncan McLaren’s Evelyn Waugh website, an interesting fact about the English writer and his first wife, also named Evelyn:

Although I call the couple he- and she-Evelyn in my book, Alexander [Evelyn Waugh’s grandson] has mentioned that at the time [late 1920s] they were called Hevelyn and Shevelyn.

(Evelyn Waugh’s first name was pronounced EEV-lyn, so “Hevelyn” and “Shevelyn” would have been HEEV-lyn and SHEEV-lyn.)

From Nina Sankovitch’s memoir Tolstoy and the Purple Chair (2011):

For my father, the consequences of war brought him far from home, and eventually across an ocean, to start over in a new world. My parents tell me I was named after the members of the corps de ballet of the Bolshoi, most of whom were named Nina. They went to see a performance of the Bolshoi just days before I was born. But I also know that my name is another ripple effect of the war, coming from my father’s sister Antonina, who was murdered that night in 1943.

(Three of her Belarusian father’s siblings — Sergei, Antonina, and Boris — were killed one night during WWII.)

From a 2012 interview with Somali British poet Warsan Shire:

Warsan means “good news” and Shire means “to gather in one place”. My parents named me after my father’s mother, my grandmother. Growing up, I absolutely wanted a name that was easier to pronounce, more common, prettier. But then I grew up and understood the power of a name, the beauty that comes in understanding how your name has affected who you are. My name is indigenous to my country, it is not easy to pronounce, it takes effort to say correctly and I am absolutely in love with the sound of it and its meaning. Also, it’s not the kind of name you baby, slip into sweet talk mid sentence, late night phone conversation, whisper into the receiver kind of name, so, of that I am glad.

From a 2012 New York Magazine article about author Toni Morrison, born Chloe Wofford, who “deeply regrets” not putting her birth name on her books:

“Wasn’t that stupid?” she says. “I feel ruined!” Here she is, fount of indelible names (Sula, Beloved, Pilate, Milkman, First Corinthians, and the star of her new novel, the Korean War veteran Frank Money), and she can’t own hers. “Oh God! It sounds like some teenager–what is that?” She wheeze-laughs, theatrically sucks her teeth. “But Chloe.” She grows expansive. “That’s a Greek name. People who call me Chloe are the people who know me best,” she says. “Chloe writes the books.” Toni Morrison does the tours, the interviews, the “legacy and all of that.”

From the Amazon.com bio of author Caitlin Moran:

Caitlin isn’t really her name. She was christened ‘Catherine.’ But she saw ‘Caitlin’ in a Jilly Cooper novel when she was thirteen and thought it looked exciting. That’s why she pronounces it incorrectly: ‘Catlin.’ It causes trouble for everyone.

From Little Failure: A Memoir (1996) by Gary Shteyngart (born Igor Steinhorn):

I have clearly spent thirty-nine years unaware that my real destiny was to go through life as a Bavarian porn star, but some further questions present themselves: If neither Gary nor Shteyngart is truly my name, then what the hell am I doing calling myself Gary Shteyngart? Is every single cell in my body a historical lie?

From a 2020 article about baby names by journalist Dilvin Yasa in the Sydney Morning Herald:

When you have a name like Dilvin, you spend an awful amount of time thinking about baby names and the role our monikers play in our lives. Will little Exoduss ever spearhead a Fortune 500 company? Can Bambi push through our collective prejudice and go on to become a respected neurosurgeon? Had my parents named me Deborah, Sally or Carolyn, would I really be a CEO by now instead of a writer, as a famous LinkedIn survey suggests?

From the 2012 obituary of author Maurice Sendak in Slate:

He adored Melville, Mozart, and Mickey Mouse (and would have noted the alliteration with pleasure — he wrote in different places about the mysterious significance he attached to the letter M, his own first initial and that of many of his characters, beginning with Max of Where the Wild Things Are).

From The Life of William Shakespeare: A Critical Biography (2012) by Lois Potte:

Though contemporary sonneteers populated their world with lovers called Astrophil, Parthenophil, Stella, Delia, and Idea, the only names that appear in Shakespeare’s sonnets are Adonis, Helen, Mars, Saturn, Philomel, Eve, Cupid, Diana, and Time — and the one non-mythological figure, the author, “Will.”

From a 1911 newspaper article about writers such as Georgia writer Corra Mae Harris (1869-1935):

Mrs. Harris finds much trouble in impressing the fact that her name is “Corra” and not “Cora” — the word being a family name.

(I quoted the same source in this post about author Zane Grey.)

For more quotes about names, check out the name quotes category.

Images: Oscar Wilde, Maya Angelou

[Latest update: Oct. 2023]