I’ve just finished reading the second book of an English translation of the Japanese classic Musashi, by Yoshikawa Eiji.
In the book, the main character, Musashi, has challenged the Young Master of the Yoshioka school of swordsmanship. The Young Master is the eldest son of the school’s founder Yoshioka Kendo. The son’s name is Seijuro.
He has a younger brother whose name is Denshichiro.
So now I’m a little bit confused. I don’t speak Japanese, but I was under the impression that “-ichiro” in a name indicated “first son”, or something along those lines. If that is the case, then I’m wondering why the second son in the story is named Denshichiro.
Am I misunderstanding something? Probably.
Also, there is a scene in the story where Musashi has introduced himself to another man, and the other man asks him how he writes his name. Musashi replies, “I write it the same as Takezo.” Takezo was his birth name, but he later took the name Musashi. So why did he not change the way he writes his name? I suppose I’m missing something here, too. Was his reply symbolic? Or should it be taken literally? The only thing I can think of is related to what a Japanese woman told me about naming: when parents name a child, they choose kanji that they like, and that kanji becomes the child’s name. Can I take this to mean that the kanji for a person’s given name might actually have little to do with how their name is spoken? Some time back, just for fun, I started typing Japanese girl’s names into a translation site, and the site kept returning things like “white lotus floating on a still pond at dawn”. So, can a spoken name indeed change while the written name remains the same?
You’re correct that Ichiro means “first son”. It is written phonetically with three characters: i-chi-ro or いちろ (if Japanese characters work here). The first i in Denshichiro is actually part of the shi, not a standalone sound, so it breaks up as den-shi-chi-ro or でんしちろ. So there actually isn’t an ichiro in Denshichiro; it’s only there in the English transliteration.
For your second question, kanji can have several different pronunciations. Two names that are written the same can be pronounced differently, and two names that sound the same could be written differently. Very confusing…
Just to add a little bit to what carterba said, in this case Denshichiro presumably refers to the 7th son, with the three kanji being split up as den-shichi-ro, where ‘shichi’ means 7, and ‘ro’ is the traditional suffix for sons.
As for your second question, Musashi was speaking literally. The characters he chose for Musashi can also be pronounced ‘Takezo’.
There are all kinds of systems that parents can use when choosing the kanji for their child’s name, with various superstitions regards total number of brush strokes used in writing the name, etc. AFAIK, though, the kanji chosen are always an established way of writing that name (although possibly an obscure one). Also, a given kanji can have multiple readings. For example, the kanji for ‘love’ can be read as either ‘Ai’ or ‘Megumi’ when used as a first name (or as ‘mi’ when part of a compound).
This can be confusing, of course, even for the Japanese. Sometimes at school the teachers write in the pronunciation for confusing names in the attendance lists.
Thanks for the answers. I should have caught the syllables of Denshichiro, since I knew a syllable shouldn’t end with an S sound. I think I know why I read “ichiro” in there - I’m a big fan of the Seattle Mariners baseball team and their right fielder is Ichiro Suzuki. So the “ichiro” part stood out for me when I read the name.
That’s interesting that the name would indicate “7th son”. The book only mentioned two sons. Perhaps it was just a matter of only the first and seventh sons choosing to remain at the school their father founded? Or I suppose these could simply be the only surviving sons. heh I really need to read the whole story. Unfortnately, all I have is the second of five books, and the ending of the second book makes it clear that I really need to read all five. The second book, at least, wasn’t meant to be read by itself.
Arigato,
Rikku Ozubo-n
???
And doggonit, I guess it doesn’t like my katakana 