Topic: The Significance of Names

[tpe]

This description brings to mind the Paul Simon song from 1965, "I Am A Rock". Most of us of a certain, ahem age, can probably recite the melody from this song in our head. The lyrics are a good picture of Ennis and go something like this . . .

I am a rock,
I am an island.
I've built walls,
A fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain.
Its laughter and its loving I disdain.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

Dont talk of love,
But Ive heard the words before;
Its sleeping in my memory.
I wont disturb the slumber of feelings that have died.
If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

I agree.  This seems to have been written specifically for Ennis.

[tpe]

Sounds of Silence. 

This also. 

[lancecowboy]

Very interesting,Thomas.Then,the meaning of his name and surname as "Island of the sea" has a greater significance.Ennis was a man of an one or only choice,but was as isolated as an island,alone in the inmensity of the sea;he must very  often to hide this choice he made because of his own isolation,because of not being able to share this choice with nobody,even with himself.

This is so interesting! Ennis - Island of the sea - the man who built the fortress to keep the world out. What's a better fortress than the ocean. Few island nations had ever been successfully invaded. That makes Jack Twist a William the Conquerer.

 

[Lis]

The significence of the name "Ennis" being an isolated island in sea is so interesting and really describes Ennis. Very distant from the rest of the world and surrounded by old traditions, never to change.

I write random stories and me and my friend were thinkin' of names for our charaters and she picked "Seth" for one. That charater became pretty much the antogonist and bad guy in our story and when I was randomly search a baby name definition site, I checked out the name it pretty much means "Devil's Advocate" 

Interesting? We didn't even realize it!!

[tpe]

Names are fascinating.

In the choice of the name "Jack Twist", we have evidence that Proulx was being deliberate about the choice of name for this character (i.e., in her dedication to Jake Gyllenhaal on the copy of BBM she gave him.)  I would think that there was a similar deliberation with the choice of the name "Ennis del Mar".