Criminal Minds: The Naming of Cats (Reid)

[truepenny]

Gideon
Hotch
JJ
Garcia
Elle
Morgan
Prentiss


SPENCER REID

Withycombe does not admit Spencer as a first name.

Rule says:

Middle English: Spencer. "Dispenser of provisions." A man in charge of the village or manor house provisions. H. Spencer Lewis, historian, archaeologist; Spencer Tracy, actor.

Spence says:

[French] 'Shopkeeper; dispenser of provisions'

My suspicion is that if Reid's first name points to anything, it's to Edmund Spenser, 16th century English poet and author of The Faerie Queene, a massive (incomplete) narrative poem in which various knights go questing about the highly allegorical landscape and defeat monsters and sorcerers and all kinds of really cool stuff happens. (I like The Faerie Queene a lot.) Spenser also positions it as a kind of prequel to the Arthurian cycle, since one of the knights is Arthur himself, questing in search of/to bring honor to Gloriana, the eponymous Faerie Queene and a transparent stand-in for Elizabeth I. (We never actually see Gloriana; she's the absent center of the poem.) The knights are all allegorical (allegory in Spenser is very complicated, but that's really a subject for another post), and one of them is female, so there's a possibility that, along with mapping onto Arthurian knights and archangels, the BAU may map onto Spenserian knights as well, which is appropriate because Spenserian quests tend to be highly ambiguous and sometimes only dubiously successful. And no matter what the allegorical monster looks like, the knights are always really fighting themselves.

According to Rule, who lists it as a first name, Reid is a variant of Read which is from the Old English for "red-headed" or "red-complexioned." (Spence concurs, and since read does actually mean "red" in Anglo-Saxon, I think we can provisionally take it as true.) I think the importance of Reid for CM, though, is the multiplicity of puns it allows.

Read--20,000 words a minute
Reed--as in the phrase "a weak reed." Considering the importance of the weak/strong dichotomy in "Revelations," this seems deeply relevant.
Rede--counsel

You can even make an argument for Reid's name as being kludged together to mean "dispenser of counsel," which fits with his status as the walking reference library of the BAU.

Comments

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Concur.

"Rede" can also be used as "Law."

And:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reid_technique

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Oh, and, of course, there is a far more famous fictional detective also named after the poet:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spenser_(fictional_detective)

[cheshyre]

Question (because hardboiled detectives were rarely my thing): Did Robert B. Parker name his detective Spencer because Raymond Chandler named his detective Marlowe?
And how many other Elizabethan playwrights are running around solving crimes?

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Yes.

And the only other one I know about is Fletcher.

I mean to do something with Jonson one of these days though, if I ever skip genres.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

omg can you imagine what Webster would be like as a private eye?

o.O

...

I so want to write that now.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

do it!

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

The woman in my office had been dead for five days when I found her.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

The smell was unbearable, but the ghost was worse.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Write this!

[nebula99.livejournal.com]

That cannot be coincidence, the writers must have known about that if they had done any research into law enforcement procedures.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

OH HELLO.

Guess what I just noticed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_serial_killers_by_country#USA

...considering Hotch and Gideon's conversation regarding naming Jack, I don't think that's coincidence.

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

Also, in either the 1st or 2nd episode (we watched both Thursday night) Hotch and Gideon have a discussion about names reminding them of serial killers in the context of figuring out a name for Hotch's upcoming progeny.

MKK

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

That was what I just said. *g*

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

Sigh. This hotel *says* they have free wifi in the rooms. They lie. You really have to go to the lobby to get a usable signal. There's a convention of very young cheerleaders in town and it seems like they are all staying at this hotel. Reading in a lobby full of giggling and shrieking pre- to just pubescent girls is really doing a number on my comprehension. Apparently I am losing my fabled abiblity to concentrate no matter what.

MKK

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

;-)

[beatriceeagle.livejournal.com]

So, call me ridiculously slow, but what did you notice?

(Also, in keeping with recent episodes, I noticed at least four women in that list.)

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

None of our guys' names are on that list.

[beatriceeagle.livejournal.com]

...You're right. Not even Jack's is, although there's Jack the Ripper, but he wasn't American.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

There's a "Derrick." Which is the closest they get.

I suspect this also helps explain why all the men on the team have somewhat uncommon first names.

[beatriceeagle.livejournal.com]

It might, although I don't think that they're all that uncommon. I know at least two Aarons, and I feel like I know a Jason, although I can't for the life of me recall any specifics.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know or have known people with all those names. They're not *unusual* names. They're "somewhat uncommon."

[beatriceeagle.livejournal.com]

I actually don't know any Spencers or Dereks (although I know five Jennifers and eight Emilys...). But yes, I know what you mean. They're not (with the exception of Jason, for me) names that immediately spring to mind when someone asks you to think of a boy's name.

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

I've known several Dereks (of various spellings) and in fact have a cousin named Derek. On the other hand, I know no Jennifers. Could be a generational thing as I'm way more ancient than most of y'all. I've known a Spencer too, but that was long ago and in another country. (And besides the wench is dead.)

MKK

[bibliotrope.livejournal.com]

To add to the mythological values of "Reid" as a name:

The Lone Ranger's last name is Reid, as is that of his great-nephew (or great-great-) the Green Hornet. (cf., among other sources, http://www.endeavorcomics.com/largent/ranger/faq.html)

[rufinia.livejournal.com]

Wandered here from somewhere else....

"Reid"is an element of two Norweigan names: The male being Reidar, whihc means "Home army" or "home warrior" and the female (my name) being Reidun, which means "home loving." Reid means "home." (It's also pronounced "Raid" not "Reed" but this being America, I know it's easier to sometimes just go with the mispronounciation than constantly correct it.) I have NO idea if Reid would ever be used as a Scandinavian surname.