Names in literature are such a huge deal, specifically, the concept of receiving a new name. Either choosing a new name, or having one bestowed upon you, signifies a new beginning. It’s Saul turning to Paul. It’s Ben Kenobi becoming Obi-wan. Names invoke the person to whom they belong and therefore have a power. They can have a power over that person, like Kunte Kinte losing his identity and becoming “Toby.” They can have power over other people, like “Voldemort.” They can make a person big, like “Superman”, or small like “Clark Kent.” Names seem to be what makes a thing into a something, what attaches it to the rest of the world. Most of all, names can provide personal power to their bearers, or perhaps, a false sense of that power.
O.E. Parker and Hulga are two of O’Connor’s characters who have willingly changed their names. Their reasons for doing so are perhaps a little unclear. Both seem on the surface to have changed their names simply because they can. Yet underneath the surface we can see that these two characters have changed their names because they wish to escape what they are. Obadiah Elihue and Joy were both lost souls who did not understand who they are, what they are meant to be. I think that they chose to rename themselves because they thought that would give them the sense of identity they didn’t have. Moreover, it would help to separate them from where they came from. In renaming themselves they felt that they had acquired some sort of power not only over themselves but in those around them. O.E. Parker would not share his real name with anyone, before he met his wife. He was then able to keep his real name a secret. He did not have to share that part of himself with anyone and that gave him a weird sense of strength. For Hulga the opposite was true. She hates when Mrs. Freeman addresses her by “Hulga” instead of Joy since she feels that her new moniker is a personal affair. It seems to be her own sacred way of connecting with herself.
Yet both of these characters ultimately sacrifice their chosen names to stronger characters. O.E. surrenders to being Obadiah Elihue for his wife. Hulga will forever be Joy to her mother, because try as she might she cannot escape her roots. So it makes one wonder, for these characters, did renaming themselves give them a sense of security that they then lost? Or was it only a mask of security that they never had in the first place?