A note on character names.

Henry's locked in his apartment and can't get out. Bless.

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Chrysaor
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A note on character names.

Post by Chrysaor »

I have looked through this section of the forum extensively, and I've yet to find anything on this. It's nothing too important, but it is rather interesting. It is regarding the meaning of the character's names that appear in Silent Hill 4.

Henry (root: German) means 'Ruler of the Home'. The connection should be painfully obvious to anyone who's played the game, but this is just another example of just how far Team Silent dug to create depth.

Eileen (From Helen; Root: Gaelic) means 'Light'. Eileen is Henry's 'Light in the Darkness', so to speak. Again, another obvious connection.

Walter (Root: German) means 'Army General'. This one may not have any connection at all, and it took me a while to think of anything. However, with every sacrament that Walter performs, another soul comes under his 'Army'. If Walter has any other possible meanings, or if anyone can come up with something better, let me know.

Cynthia (Root: Greek) means 'The moon personified'. This one is very interesting indeed. According to tarot translation, 'The Moon' (Card number 18; sadly, this does not match her victim number, but still manages to match her persona exactly) personifies bewilderment, imagination, illusions, and fear, and often represents a dreamlike state where nothing seems to be real. Another interesting factoid is that Cynthia is another name for the goddess Artemis, who is the goddess of fertility.

Jasper (Root: English) means 'A semi-precious stone'. I didn't take any meaning from this at first, but then I realized that Jasper is partaking in a bit of archaeology, isn't he? Gein is a reference to Ed Gein, but I can't really find any similarities between the two. Perhaps I'll have to dig deeper. EDIT: It looks like I've created a spectacular pun, but didn't really realize it at first. Gein may be a reference to the nature of Jasper. While Ed Gein dug up corpses to try to personify his mother (whom he absolutely worshipped, albeit in a rather strange way), Jasper Gein attempted to dig up artefacts that proved the existance of The Order's God. They both sook comfort in a similar way.

Although Andrew fits just about the opposite description of the root of his name ('Manly, Courageous', unless you take 'Manly' to mean 'Violent and overbearing', and 'Courageous' to mean 'Having the stones to abuse children'), his last name is a rather obvious reference to The Boston Strangler. Interestingly enough, Albert DeSalvo (The Boston Strangler) was stabbed to death in a prison. EDIT: Also note that Mary Sullivan is one of the more memorable victims of Albert DeSalvo, as well as his last; Even if she was a rape victim, I feel that this is still applicable.

Richard (Root: English) means 'Powerful ruler', and that should be obvious enough, considering Richard's personality. He 'rules' over the other tenants with his anger. His last name, Braintree, is a rather obscure reference to a murder case. See if you can spot all of the similarities here. In the town of Braintree, Massachusetts, in 1920, two anarchists (Nikola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti) were falsely accused of murder (With a revolver as one of the murder weapons, no less), and were sentenced to death in the electric chair. To top all of that off, the Mayor of Braintree at the time was Joe Sullivan.

Even though he is James' father, Frank (Root: Latin; meaning 'Free') Sunderland can be taken into a context all his own. His name would literally translate to 'Free from the Land of Sin', and since you often see him outside of your room, completely oblivious to what is going on, this connection makes perfect sense.

Joseph (Root: Hebrew, meaning 'God Will Increase') took me quite a while to wrap my head around. But his name in itself is a warning if you put it into the right context (The Room, being all but God to Walter, is slowly increasing it's power through the course of Walter's actions), and since his entire purpose in the game is to warn you of this, this is another brilliant connection. Also, his last name, Schreiber, is German for 'Writer'. Since he's a journalist, this can be taken quite literally.

This is all I can come up with for now. Hopefully, this expanded your knowledge of the game at least a little bit more. Feel free to add anything you can come up with, as it would be greatly appreciated.
Last edited by Chrysaor on 11 Jan 2010, edited 5 times in total.
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carneeval
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Post by carneeval »

This is awesome, I was a while ago going to put up a forum similar to this after I looked up only a few of these names, but I did not have this much information! Something I found was Joseph being a journalist, the man who invented the Pulitzer prize (For anyone who doesn't know what this is, it's a award given to journalists) his name was Joseph Pulitzer.
But it's strange how the different makers will reuse names:
Henry: Puzzle in 2 and 0, of course main character of 4
Joseph: Mental patient in 2 and journalist in 4
Richard: Character in 4 and Father in 0
I believe there was more but I can't remember.
[img]http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/animefairyofdarkness/o0p1cpjpgcopy.jpg[/img]
Most people say Henry's a pervert because of looking through the peephole to Eileen's room, but here's the thing: Your not required to do that, it's the players choice.
So whose the pervert now :P?

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Post by AuraTwilight »

This is awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome. I can't even think of anything to contribute because it's flawless.
[quote="BlackFire2"]I thought he meant the special powers of her vagina.[/quote]
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The Adversary
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Post by The Adversary »

Team Silent didn't create last names for the characters; Jeremy Blaustein, the English translator, gave them surnames.
Last edited by The Adversary on 11 Jan 2010, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Droo »

A perfect companion piece to go with my similar nominal analysis for James and Mary/Maria from SH2.

Someone should tackle the Homecoming and SH1 names next!
"Oh yeah, I've been here before
I can see it with eyes closed
Shadows that look like blood
Dead as far as the mind goes
Fear that comes from my head
Lives in the mirror"
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Post by Chrysaor »

Thank you for all of the kind words. They are greatly appreciated. It took a lot of research to gain this much information, but I feel that there is definitely more to be found. I'll continue to edit my original post to add information as I see fit. I still have yet to find anything on the other victims or the residents of South Ashfield Heights, but there has to be something there.
MMY wrote:Team Silent didn't create last names for the characters; Jeremy Blaustein, the English translator, gave them surnames.
If that's the case, then I have a lot more respect for Jeremy Blaustein. If the characters weren't created around their surnames (Especially Richard Braintree), then it's incredible that he was able to find last names that fit a few of the characters so well. Also, if he's the one who decided to include the last names of other characters in the series, then this also helps tie the games together. If the English version has more information to pick apart, then I see that as a good thing.
Droo wrote:A perfect companion piece to go with my similar nominal analysis for James and Mary/Maria from SH2.

Someone should tackle the Homecoming and SH1 names next!
I'm working on it, actually. The thing about the character's names from Silent Hill is that they are mostly references to actual people, and don't have much to do with the actual meanings of the names themselves (making information much harder to find). I also have some things I'd like to add to your thread, and I may do that soon.

I haven't found much on Homecoming, but then again, I haven't tried very hard. This might've just given me the inspiration to do so. I have a feeling that they are akin to the obscure references that the original Silent Hill had as well.
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Post by The Adversary »

>If that's the case, then I have a lot more respect for Jeremy Blaustein.
By Mr. Blaustein's admission, some of the surnames were chosen simply b/c they are the names of towns in Massachusetts, his home-state; others were chosen almost arbitrarily.
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Post by Chrysaor »

MMY wrote:By Mr. Blaustein's admission, some of the surnames were chosen simply b/c they are the names of towns in Massachusetts, his home-state; others were chosen almost arbitrarily.
Ouch. I knew quite a few of them all existed in Massachusetts, but I didn't know that most of them were picked out so randomly (especially when, for the most part, they can really be picked apart rather extensively).

Dumb luck, possibly? Or maybe he's just not letting on as much as he could?

I refuse to think that the selection of 'Braintree' is a coincidence. Richard shares so many similarities with the Sacco and Vanzetti case that it would be nearly impossible to pick that out of a hat. Maybe Team Silent looked into the names after the fact, if they weren't chosen in post-production?

Also, the connections to DeSalvo and Gein aren't arbitrary. They are the last names of serial murderers, although connecting Andrew DeSalvo to The Boston Strangler was much easier than connecting Jasper to Ed Gein; the connections are still there.

I'll still continue to pick the surnames apart, as it is still a great interest of mine, and it still serves to make me respect the game more.

Note that I don't take the Japanese version of the game as the end-all canonical version, simply because it is the source material. It is not the version that I have experienced, and since Japanese tends to be such a figurative language, it is hard to take someone's (English) word as the truth.
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Post by The Adversary »

>I'll still continue to pick the surnames apart, as it is still a great interest of mine
I'm certainly not suggesting you shouldn't. After all, I wrote a 10-page paper last year about charactonyms in Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49, so this isn't a topic I'm disinterested in or dissuasive of. However, I'll liken a lot of these analyses to horoscopes and astrology: fun coincidences. There's no scientific bases in either, yet so many of the coincidences are applicable to individuals. Generally one can find, through assiduous research, any connection they wish to make via linguistics, onomatology, toponymy, &c.

There is, after all, an awful lot to work w/.
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Post by Mephisto »

Hey Chrysaor that's awesome! I knew about Jasper, Henry and Joseph's name but that's about it, really good work. I have nothing more to say than: Awesome 8)
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Post by Arsonist »

I did that long ago on names of all the characters, cause I’m a geek like that. Never posted a thread though.

I thought Cheryl and Harry were the most appropriate names. “Master of the home” and “Beloved”.

Leonard Wolf is funny, Lion Wolf. I know that in Dante’s “Divine Comedy” the lion represented pride and the wolf envy. I can see pride in Leonard, but envy not so much. Although, if he’s a true narcissist, envy is pretty much given.

Alessa and Alex have the same appropriate meaning, “Defender of men”. However Alessa can also mean “the chosen one”.

Right, but this is about SH4 characters, sorry!


I think they’re all coincidences though, in every game. Fun coincidences, but coincidences all the same.
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Post by Chrysaor »

MMY wrote:I'm certainly not suggesting you shouldn't. After all, I wrote a 10-page paper last year about charactonyms in Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49, so this isn't a topic I'm disinterested in or dissuasive of. However, I'll liken a lot of these analyses to horoscopes and astrology: fun coincidences. There's no scientific bases in either, yet so many of the coincidences are applicable to individuals. Generally one can find, through assiduous research, any connection they wish to make via linguistics, onomatology, toponymy, &c.

There is, after all, an awful lot to work w/.
I'll agree, to a certain extent. Knowing the meaning of the character names does not have any intrinsic effect on the understanding of the storyline, and I've even noted that the connections I've made are not all that important. However, they do serve to further the artistic expression of the game. Since most of these 'coincidences' are obviously well-thought-out, they also show the amount of effort that the team put into making the game, and that gives me that much more respect for them. If I expended this much effort into researching nearly any other book or script, I would either come up short, or be forced to make some ridiculous connections that would probably only appeal to me alone. Only stories with a lot of effort put into them tend to include any worthwhile character symbolism at all.

True, some of these connections are unintentional, but if you can find depth that the developers didn't even originally intend, then I feel that you can further a work of art past the point of it's creation. Since Silent Hill requires so much user feedback to even begin to comprehend it, this may even be the developers' intentions. Limiting yourself to scientific basis only will leave you pretty constricted, as far as this game goes.

If I can show someone an opinion that they didn't even exist on either side of prior to discovering mine, then it makes me feel like my effort is not simply self indulgence, and I gain a certain sense of pride from it. If they expound on ideas from there, and formulate their own opinion, then that's even better.
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Post by jimmy_stone »

really awesome indeed :D everything seems to fit the characters personality,very interesting
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Post by Chrysaor »

Thank you, and congratulations on your first post. I'm honored that my thread merits it. Hopefully you'll enjoy your time here at the Silent Hill Heaven Forum as much as I have.
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Post by sumcaker »

Well done good sir. :mrgreen:
This is really awesome Chrysaor, Thats nice to know how the the characters get their names :mrgreen:
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Post by AuraTwilight »

Alessa can also mean “the chosen one”.
Gee, that's subtle. ¬_¬
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Post by BloodyFanGirl »

Wow, this is awesome! 8D
Thanks for researching and compiling this.
Name meanings, origins and how they reflect upon the character they're given to have always fascinated me.
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