Var kommer Dursleys namn från?

8

JK Rowling är en författare som tycks ha haft ont att välja namn för hennes karaktärer noggrant: klok Minerva McGonagall, svår Severus Snape, Sirius Black den svarta hunden, Lupin vargen och så vidare. Vad sägs om namnen på hennes Muggle -karaktärer - särskilt de obehagliga av Muggles som vi ser mest ut i serien, Vernon och Petunia Dursley och deras son Dudley?

Vad var JK Rowlings inspiration för namnet Dursleys?

    
uppsättning Rand al'Thor 19.02.2016 12:23

2 svar

17

JK Rowling har svarat på den här frågan i en Pottermoreartikel om Dursleys . Den mest intressanta är Petunia, vars namn tydligen kommer från en halvt ihågkommen tecknad JKR såg som ett barn med en orolig kvinna som heter Petunia . Citera från själva artikeln (betona min):

Vernon and Petunia were so-called from their creation, and never went through a number of trial names, as so many other characters did. ‘Vernon’ is simply a name I never much cared for. ‘Petunia’ is the name that I always gave unpleasant female characters in games of make believe I played with my sister, Di, when we were very young. Where I got it, I was never sure, until recently a friend of mine played me a series of public information films that were shown on television when we were young (he collects such things and puts them on his laptop to enjoy at leisure). One of them was an animation in which a married couple sat on a cliff enjoying a picnic and watching a man drowning in the sea below (the thrust of the film was, don’t wave back - call the lifeguard). The husband called his wife Petunia, and I suddenly wondered whether that wasn’t where I had got this most unlikely name, because I have never met anybody called Petunia, or, to my knowledge, read about them. The subconscious is a very odd thing. The cartoon Petunia was a fat, cheery character, so all I seem to have taken is her name.

The surname ‘Dursley’ was taken from the eponymous town in Gloucestershire, which is not very far from where I was born. I have never visited Dursley, and I expect that it is full of charming people. It was the sound of the word that appealed, rather than any association with the place.

    
svaret ges 19.02.2016 12:26
2

Medan Rand al'Thor gjorde ett bra jobb att fånga sin egen mjukboll, nämner hans svar inget om Dudley Dursleys förnamn.

Som avslöjs av Rowling i en tidig intervju kommer namnet Dudley från namnet på en plats som hon hittat på en karta.

I kind of collect unusual names. You have to be very careful about telling me your name if you do have an unusual name because I'll probably put you in a book and I make a lot of the names up. But mostly maps. Maps are a great source for names. Dursley and Dudley and Snape are all, erm, places I can't visit anymore obviously.
Blue Peter (cBBC), 12 March, 2001

Rowling angav inte vilken plats, men en snabb Google-sökning efter "Dudley UK" dyker upp den här staden , som beskrivs som "en stor stad i West Midlands of England, 6 miles (9,7 km) sydost om Wolverhampton och 10,5 miles (16,9 km) nordväst om Birmingham."

    
svaret ges 12.02.2017 09:43