Only Known By Their Nickname / Literature

People who are Only Known by Their Nickname in literature.

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• The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi: Crafty Dalila, the Mistress of Poisons, is an alias. She even refuses to reveal her true name to Amina, her closest friend, saying that "names are for tombstones".
• Candlewick (a.k.a. Lampwick in other versions) the troublesome boy Pinocchio befriends from The Adventures of Pinocchio, in his introduction it is revealed his real name is Romeo and he got the aforementioned nickname because he was so tall and thin.
• The Afterward: Carster's actual name is Castriar, but this was used instead since as a girl she called herself when unable to pronounce it.
• The Agent Z books give us a minor character who ended up known as "The Incredible Hulk", as he was overheard slowly reading the words "I... am... The Incredible Hulk" from a comic whilst newly arrived with his family from India and still teaching himself English. What he thought about this nickname is not discussed, but it stuck because nobody could pronounce his given name.
• In Ark Angel of the Alex Rider series. Alex encounters 4 thugs which he nicknames "Combat Jacket", "Silver Tooth", "Spectacle" and "Steel Watch".
• Amelia Peabody's son Ramses. No, a Victorian Age English couple did not name their son after an Egyptian Pharaoh, but you could be forgiven for thinking they did, given how rarely his real name (Walter) is mentioned in the books.
• The main protagonist in American Gods is called Shadow, a nickname he earned when he was young by quietly following adults at the hospital where he spent most of his time. Even in his thirties, he mostly goes by this nickname, occasionally uses an alias, and not once in the entire book is his true name revealed. Toward the end, after he dies but before his afterlife is decided, he takes an opportunity to learn his role in the grand scheme, and has to pay admission with his own name. When the personification of Easter brings him back to life, he remembers what he learned, and remembers having to trade something for that knowledge, but doesn't remember the cost, implying that he no longer realizes Shadow is just his nickname.
  • Though, if any of you really are curious, a follow up short story reveals that his real name is Balder. Which, really, we should've seen coming.
  • The main protagonist of its companion novel, Anansi Boys, has a similar issue. Any nickname his father (Anansi) gives someone tends to stick to a literally supernatural degree, so when his dad called him "Fat Charlie" as a boy, everyone around him would call him that well into adulthood, even though he wasn't particularly overweight.
• The Anderssons: Mandi is really named Amanda, but her family and her friends will never call her that. And the fact that her abusive husband will call her "Amanda" sets him apart from the rest.
• Almost all of Anne and Gilbert's children in L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables series are known exclusively by their nicknames. Their first child, Joyce, is called "Joy" during her short life. The next child, James, is known as "Jem". Younger twins Anne and Diana go by "Nan" and "Di", for obvious reasons. Youngest child Bertha Marilla goes exclusively by "Rilla".
• Annie on My Mind: Liza's full name, Eliza, is said a few times but Liza never goes by it.
• Piers Anthony's Apprentice Adept series: Most of the regular human characters either are referred to by their titles (Adept Red, Adept Black, etc. Stile's wife, Lady Blue) or by names they took on later in life (Stile had his name changed when he reached legal adulthood, Rifleman changed his after he won the Great Tournament). We, the reader never told what their real or birth names are (presumably, Stile knows his wife's real name). The only exceptions we see among the regular cast are Citizen Merle (and as a Citizen, there's no guarantee that's her given name), Tania and Tanu (twin children of Adept Tan, the latter of whom takes on the title later on), and Stile and Lady Blue's son, Bane.^note As a Ridiculously Human Robot, Bane's Proton alternate, Mach, doesn't count here.
• Noble House: Casey Tcholok always goes by Casey, and is actually frightened by the skill of Struans' intelligence gathering group when Ian Dunross, seemingly off-hand, addresses her by her legal name, Kamalian Ciranoush.
• Isaac Asimov's Foundation Series: In "The Mule", Magnifico Giganticus is a name that he says was given to him by the Mule, and he was originally called Bobo. However, he is the Mule, which means both names are fictitious, and the Mule is something he called himself. So we never learn Magnifico's real name.
• The Baby-Sitters Club:
  • Stacey, treasurer of the club. It wasn't until she moved away that the rest of the club even found out that Stacey was a nickname for Anastasia.
  • Also Jessi and her siblings. Not too bad for Jessi (Jessica) and Becca (Rebecca), but their poor little brother Squirt; even the ghostwriters rarely remembered that his real name was John Phillip Ramsey Jr. (for example, when Jessi addressed a letter to her parents 'Mr. and Mrs. Alex Ramsey').
  • Kristy, Abby, and many minor characters.
• The magicians in The Bartimaeus Trilogy all use nicknames, because they can't control the demons if they know their true name. The demons would prefer their names not to be known either (so they can't be summoned), but use them nonetheless.
• Bat's full name is Bixby Alexander Tam, but nobody uses it except his dad. His nickname comes from his initials, from his love of animals, from the earmuffs he wears to deal with Sensory Overload at school, and from his habit of flapping his hands like a bat's wings.
• Prince Kheldar is referred to as "Silk" throughout The Belgariad, except by those who don't know him well or want to tease him. Garion and Durnik both call Polgara "Pol" almost exclusively, and Garion thinks of Belgarath only as "Mister Wolf" until well into the third book.
• Bunny Manders, the narrator (and The Watson) of the Raffles stories, is only ever referred to as Bunny or Mr. Manders; his real name (Harry) is mentioned only once.
• Many of Bertie Wooster's cronies go exclusively by nicknames; in Thank You, Jeeves, he is amused to finally learn that the first name of his long-time friend "Chuffy" Chuffnell is Marmaduke.
• Almost every character in Glen Cook's The Black Company novels is covered either by this trope or Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep". ^note  Justified in-universe as the narration focuses on Company Brothers, who take a new name (usually given by existing Brothers) when they join to symbolically leave their past life behind. In addition, this is Serious Business for wizards, as a sorcerer can lose all his powers by someone invoking his True Name, motivating the most powerful Evil Sorcerors to kill everyone who knows them by anything but their nickname. Certain characters in the series take this to extremes.
  • When Croaker is asked for his real name to be put on his Commission as General, it takes him a few minutes to remember it. He specifically avoids mentioning it in the Annals (his narration).
  • "Stormshadow" is a nickname used to cover a different nickname that she was known by in the North before faking her death.
  • Tobo and the Daughter of Night don't have real names, only nicknames, owing to the peculiar circumstances surrounding their births and childhoods. "Tobo" is explicitly stated to be a nickname given by his mother until she could reunite with his father and they could agree on a real name. By the time that happens, the boy is a teenager. The Daughter of Night was kidnapped at birth and raised as The Antichrist; her parents never had the opportunity to name her (though her father favors "Chana", her mother argues that it sounds too much like "Kina", the name of the Goddess that the Daughter serves) and her captors have no use for an identity beyond the Daughter of Night. Though the Company does eventually start calling her "Booboo", mostly as a joke.
• Stinger is referred to as exclusively as that throughout the first Bravelands book. It isn't only revealed to be a nickname for "Seed" until 280 pages in when he is crowned Crownleaf of his troop.
• In Breakfast of Champions, Dwayne Hoover's son, named George, goes by "Bunny" to one and all.
• The Villain Protagonist from The Builders is only referred to as "The Captain". Not even his crew calls him by his real name.
• The Cat in the Stacks Mysteries:
  • Miss Dickce Ducote's real first name is Richelle, but nobody's called her that in years.
  • In book 4, Judianne Beuchamp and Henry Ainsworth Beuchamp IV are only referred to by their real names once each, in narration. They go by Sissy and Hank, respectively. Likewise, Morton "Morty" Cassity is almost never referred to by his full first name.
• The Cat Who... Series:
  • Qwill's girlfriend Polly Duncan is known by most only as Polly. Possibly no one else in Moose County knows that her Shakespeare-loving father named his daughter Hippolyta. Qwill himself also fits the trope, except that he had his name legally changed; his oldest friend Arch is almost the only other person in the world who knows that James Mackintosh Qwilleran was born Merlin James Qwilleran.
  • In book #9 (The Cat Who Went Underground), the second carpenter Qwill hires goes by Iggy. It's not until after his death that the police find his driver's license and Qwill learns his full name, Ignatius K. Small, from it.
• In Cemetery Bird, the brain-damaged teenager Latigo Dorn is known almost exclusively as Boots.
• There are a few of these in the Chalet School books, the earliest example being (the) Robin (aka Cecilia Marya Humphries). Later on there's Bifauxnen Tom Gay (real name Lucinda Muriel, and given that she's an extreme Tomboy, it's understandable why she hates her real name) and Polly Heriot (real name Hildegard).
• The Change Room: Shar's full name turns out to be Shahrzad, though she's almost always called just Shar.
• In Chasing Shadows, the gang member that shot up Corey's car is referred to as "Wiry" for much of the book.
• In Child of the Owl, Casey's friend (real name Tallulah, after actress Tallulah Bankhead) is known as Booger, due to an incident of picking her nose with a bobby pin back in elementary school. Also, Casey's cousin Pamela is known as 'Pam-Pam'.
• Agatha Christie:
  • Tuppence Beresford (nee Cowley) fromTommy and Tuppence. Her real first name is Prudence, but no-one ever uses it.
  • Bunch Harmon, Miss Marple's goddaughter in A Murder is Announced, who was "christened Diana by optimistic parents".
  • Bundle Brent (real name Lady Eileen Brent) in The Secret of Chimneys and The Seven Dials Mystery. Seven Dials also has the minor characters Rupert Bateman, who "had been nicknamed Pongo for no earthly reason whatever" at school and is still addressed as such by his schoolfriends, and Vera Daventry, who everyone calls Socks.
• The Chronicles of Dorsa:
  • Tasia is only occasionally called her full name Natasia, usually by her father or due to formality.
  • L'Linna is usually simply called Linna, including by the narrative itself.
  • Megstra is usually nicknamed Megs.
• Circleverse: Among the main characters, Sandrilene "Sandry" fa Toren and Trisana "Tris" Chandler. There's also Evumeimei "Evvy" Dingzai.
• In the Clémentine books, because the protagonist got a "fruit name", she only ever calls her little brother by vegetable names, such as "Pea Pod", "Rutabaga" and "Spinach". She is very careful never to present a scene in which his real name is used, making it a weird case of the character only being known by his nickname. Series author, Sara Pennypacker, when asked for the real name by fans, has rigidly insisted that only she and her two children will ever know the character's real name.
• In The Cloak Society, members of the titular supervillain team who develop powers eventually stop using their birth names, going only by their aliases; for example, the protagonist's parents are simply "Volt" and "Shade." This usually happens in one's teens, though Titan dropped his when he was six, and 10-year-old Misty is already bugging people to call her "the Mist".
• Code Name Verity plays this straight with its main character Queenie, who doesn't reveal her name until the end. However, when the narrative shifts to her best friend Maddie, Maddie only ever refers to her by her actual name (Julie).
  • Queenie claims she never knew the name of her superior, who she only ever refers to as the Machiavellian Intelligence Officer. Maddie reveals this to be false, although she doesn't reveal the man's name either, referring to him as John Balliol, the name of the Scottish king Julie's ancestor William Wallace lost his life defending.
• Conqueror: Jebe, the Arrow, in Bones of the Hills. His real name is Zurgadai, but in only known as Jebe because of his great skill with a bow.
• The Coral Island: Ralph Rover's real last name is never mentioned. "Rover" is a nickname he received because of his love of travel.
• Curious George's friend, "The Man With the Yellow Hat", wasn't named until the animation.
• In Daystar and Shadow, Robin doesn't even know Shadow's real name. She got her nickname from a fruit vendor in Hermosillo who said, "She is like a sombra, that girl, to you."
• In the Russian Death Zone series, most characters and anyone else living in the Five Zones goes by a nickname. Occasionally, their real first name may be revealed, but the full name will usually stay hidden. For example, the leader of the Order is known by all as Commander Hunter, which is a nickname (in English, in fact) given to him by a neo-Nazi gang shortly before the Catastrophe. Only his closest advisors know that his real first name is Savva. On the other hand, all members of the rival organization known as the Ark are required to adopt a German name by their leader Heinrich Hister, the former head of the above-mentioned gang. Another interesting case is Titanium Vine, whose name is Darling. She was found in a Human Popsicle tank with no memory of her identity but a tattoo with "DRG" on her shoulder, hence the name.
• Discworld:
  • Despite being Heterosexual Life-Partners with him for decades, Fred Colon of fame apparently had no idea Nobby Nobbs's real name is 'Cecil Wormsborough St John Nobbs', or even just his real first name until they went undercover in Jingo. Others may know his name (it presumably appears in the Watch pay accounts) but no one ever calls him it, even city nobles knew him as Nobby.
  • Discworld also features "Cut Me Own Throat" Dibbler, a purveyor of sausages in a bun of questionable nature, is only ever referred to by his catchphrase, or CMOT, or "Throat", if in a hurry. Eventually, however, in Making Money, we learn that CMOT are the initials of his actual name and probably (apart from being told the phrase by a time-travelling Vimes) the in-universe reason why he adopted the nickname in the first place.
  • The strangely familiar road-warrior dwarf in The Last Continent:
    Mad: Most people call me Mad.
    Rincewind: Just "Mad"? That's an... unusual name.
    Mad: It ain't a name.
  • A minor character in Jingo is a gang leader called The Artful Nudger ... except to Captain Carrot who calls him William. The Nudger has no idea how Carrot knows his real name — his mother probably would’ve have known his real name, if he knew who she was — and anyone else using it would be in serious trouble, but Carrot's ... Carrot.
• Divergent:
  • Tris and Four — Beatrice and Tobias are their real names, respectively.
  • Nita from Allegiant. Her full name is Juanita.
• Doctor Who Expanded Universe:
  • Among the many companions, we have: Roslyn "Roz" Forrester, Christopher "Chris" Rodonanté Cwej, Samantha "Sam" Angeline Jones, Fitzgerald "Fitz" Michael Kreiner, Beatrice "Trix" Macmillan, Thomas Hector "Hex" Schofield, Philippa "Flip" Jackson, Isabelle "Izzy" Sinclair, Gabriella "Gabby" Gonzalez, Destriianatos (Destrii) and Erimemushinteperem (Erimem). (Bernice "Benny" Surprise Summerfield and Charlotte "Charley" Pollard are arguable cases, since both have their original names used with some regularity.)
    • A regular character once told Fitz, upon hearing his full name, that he'd thought "Fitz" was his last name.
    • Then there's Frobisher, who takes on that name when he starts travelling with the Doctor. His original name is never given, and he's noted to have taken multiple names in the past (likely including the one on his office door in his first story).
  • Cinder from the New Series Adventures novel Engines of War. The Doctor finds out her real name, but the reader doesn't.
• Dolphin Boy: Dibs' real name is Douglas, but no one ever uses it. His nickname comes from Amy's mispronunciation of his name when he was a baby.
• Don Camillo: No-one ever refers to Peppone as anything other than "Peppone". He will occasionally sign official documents with "Giuseppe Bottazzi" but is more likely to use the signature "Giuseppe Bottazzi, called Peppone". If anyone calls him "Giuseppe" or "Comrade Bottazzi", it's either an outsider who doesn't know better or Don Camillo taking the mickey.
• Dora Wilk Series:
  • Everyone calls Witkacy by this nickname, and his real name is mentioned perhaps twice across all six books, and only in the most official situations.
  • As, like other demons, only goes by his nickname, because knowing a demon's name gives one complete control over them.
• Dragon Queen: Trava doesn't get the old man's name, so she just refers to him as the old man.
• Flea in the Dreamscape Voyager Trilogy is only ever referred to as Flea.
• In A Drowned Maiden's Hair, Hyacinth gave the deaf servant Muffet her nickname because she's terrified of spiders. Everyone's been using the nickname for so long that they've completely forgotten her real name, which turns out to be Anna.
• In The Easy Part of Impossible, Victoria and Connor are known exclusively as Ria and Cotton. Cotton's younger siblings are known as Jelly, Flutie, and Bo, which are presumably also nicknames.
• Win from Elliott & Win was named after Winston Cigarettes because his dad was trying to quit smoking. He understandably prefers his nickname.
• The title character of Encyclopedia Brown. Real name was Leroy.
• Andrew "Ender" Wiggin from Ender's Game, to the point where he can go around inconspicuously as Andrew Wiggin in Speaker for the Dead. (Granted, that is 3,000 years in the future due to relativistic time travel, but still...). People do occasionally recognize his name as being the same as "the Xenocide's" (a banker even accuses him of using a false ID when he sees it), but because it is so far in the future no one makes the connection.
  • Also in the later books of the Ender's Game saga many of the characters are from Lusitania, where long Portuguese names are the norm, and just about everyone goes by a nickname. These may be ordinary short forms of their names ("Liberdade Graças a Deus Figueira de Medici" becomes "Libo"), translations ("Estevão Rei Ribeira von Hesse" becomes "Quim," pronounced "king") or unrelated and based off of personal characteristics (Lauro Suleimão Ribeira von Hesse" is called "Olhado" due to his cybernetic eyes.) The full names are usually mentioned once or twice, and then ignored.
  • Then there's Julian "Bean" Delphiki, Jr. However, this is justified because he grew up on the streets and didn't have a name. Due to his size and perceived worthlessness, another street urchin told him that he isn't "worth a bean". Given that he's a result of a genetic experiment, whose "brothers and sisters" were "terminated" by the Mad Scientist when he was discovered by the authorities. At the end of Ender's Shadow, Bean discovers his biological parents and brother (his best friend from Battle School).
• Everybody Loves Large Chests: The protagonist often nicknames its demonic familiars with simple nouns. ie. "Snack" and "Arms".
• In the Fancy Nancy books, Nancy Clancy's little sister's real name is Josephine, but this is only mentioned maybe once. Otherwise, she's always called JoJo.
• In Ellis Peters' Felse novels:
  • Bunty Felse's full first name isn't revealed until about halfway through the series, and even thereafter mentioned only occasionally.
  • Several of Dominic Felse's schoolmates in Fallen Into the Pit, including "Rabbit" Warren, whose real first name is not revealed, and "Pussy" Hart, whose real name is mentioned exactly once by the narrator and never used by any of the characters.
  • James Boswell Jarvis, known to all as "Bossie", in Rainbow's End.
• Flight to the Lonesome Place has Anna Maria Rosalita, Luis Black, and Marlowe refer to Ronnie by his stage name, The Blue Boy. Anna Maria Rosalita calls him Boy Blue while Luis Black sometimes refers to him as brother Blue.
• Toby's real name from the novel The Floor of the Sky is Gwendolyn, the which few people actually know. Apparently, she's been going by that name since she was a toddler (which was indicated to be sixty-nine years ago) when she said, “That sumbitch called me Gwenlum. My name not Gwenlum. My’s Toby.” Said nickname used to be the dog's name.
• Forever Gate:
  • 'Hoodwink' is a nickname he earned as a teenage thief.
  • 'Leader' is the name of The Leader of the Users. His real name is never given.
• Fudge in the Judy Blume books is actually named "Farley Drexel Hatcher". At one point, his mother even insists on his brother calling him nothing but "Fudge". His first kindergarten teacher insists on calling him either by one of his legal names or his initials, resulting in Fudge refusing to cooperate with her and having to be transferred to another class. His baby sister Tamara Roxanne is more commonly called "Tootsie" and they only mention her real name in her introduction.
• Many of the deceased kids in ghostgirl have a "dead name" that they're frequently called. For example, Piccolo Pam swallowed her piccolo, while "Metal Mike" was listening to metal music while taking his driver's test and crashed, which caused him to have metal shards in his head as well.
• The Girl from the Miracles District:
  • The Bears never refer to themselves by their given names, so Nikita (and the reader) only identifies them by their nicknames.
  • Mister B doesn't have an actual name, so that's what Nikita always calls him.
• Girls Don't Hit:
  • Joss is short for Jocelyn, but she prefers it to that and is mostly called by her nickname.
  • Throughout most of the book, Echo is only called that since it's her cover name. Joss knows her last name, Barrett, while deliberately not finding out her true first name. Echo comes to prefer this too, saying that Echo is her real name. However, it turns out that her first name is (legally) Audrey.
• Gods and Warriors:
  • Pirra's full name is revealed to be Pirákara in Eye of the Falcon. It's never brought up again because she and Hylas both prefer the shorter Pirra.
  • In The Burning Shadow, the four slave boys Hylas is forced to work with are called Zan, Bat, Beetle and Spit. Only Zan's name is likely his given name, though Bat may really have no other name since he was Born into Slavery.
  • The late Outsider who taught Hylas tracking and surviving in the wild was called the Man of the Woods. Hylas never found out his real name, even after finding out he was his grandfather.
  • The Crocodile Tomb has a dark-skinned boy called Kem. The nickname means "black" in Egyptian and was given to him by the Egyptians when they enslaved him. Even when he tells Hylas his real name, the narration doesn't reveal what it is, only that it means "lion" in his native language.
• In Gone with the Wind, Bonnie Blue Butler is really Eugenie Victoria, but everyone calls her Bonnie after the Bonnie Blue Flag because she has blue eyes. Likewise, Aunt Pittypat Hamilton's real name (Sarah Jane) is mentioned once early in the book. Both are extremely easy to miss since the nicknames are used so ubiquitously.
• In The Gray House, all the inhabitants of the titular House are only known by nicknames they give each other. The only exception is the protagonist Smoker, whose name is revealed at one point (it's Eric Zimmerman).
• Hani and Ishu's Guide to Fake Dating: Hani, Ishu and other Bengalis are rarely called their full names. This is explained as Bengali custom, where a "dak nam" (nickname, essentially) is used familiarly most of the time. One's full legal name is usually only used for formal reasons.
• Ginevra "Ginny" Weasley from the Harry Potter series — when she was taken into the Chamber of Secrets, even the professors referred to her as "Ginny Weasley". For years, fans assumed that "Ginny" was short for "Virginia", but Word of God later revealed that her real name was "Ginevra". The only person to ever call her this was an elderly relative in the last book.
  • This is common with the Weasleys, although most of the time it's pretty easy to guess their full names, as the rest all have traditional English names.
  • Similarly Voldemort is almost always called "You-Know-Who" or "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" by those who fear him, or "The Dark Lord" by those who follow him. In turn, "Voldemort" is in itself a nickname; his real name is Tom Riddle, and it's unclear how many people even know his real name^*quite possibly because his real name is a nod to the Muggle ancestry he would prefer to forget. Said real name is occasionally mentioned by someone recalling a memory of a time when he was still known as Tom Riddle, but only Dumbledore and Harry ever refer to him by his real name in the present tense (and Harry only does so once, in the last book).
  • The Action Girl Auror introduced in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix only goes by her surname "Tonks" as a nickname and as she explains "So would you if your fool of a mother had called you Nymphadora". Her father and future husband Remus Lupin call her "Dora" which is much better even if she doesn't seem to call herself that.
  • Alastor Moody is known as "Mad-Eye" Moody to most people. When Harry first hears Dumbledore call him Alastor in a crowded room, it takes Harry a few seconds to realize who he was speaking to.
  • The Hogwarts ghosts: Nearly Headless Nick (his real name is Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington), Moaning Myrtle (her real name is Myrtle Elizabeth Warren), Fat Friar, Grey Lady (her real name is Helena Ravenclaw) and Bloody Baron.
• Hayflower And Quiltshoe: The titular sisters' real names are unknown, but everyone calls them Hayflower and Quiltshoe because they always wear a hay flower hat and shoes made of quilt, respectively.
• In Haze, Seb's best friend goes by Guzzle. His real name is never mentioned.
• He Is Your Brother: Mike's little brother Orry's real name is Lawrence, but he goes by Orry because that's what he can pronounce.
• Machen from Hieroglypics only ever refers to his friend as the Hermit, likely at the Hermit's request.
• In Hitty, Her First Hundred Years, the titular doll was originally named Mehitabel, but her original owner Phoebe shortens it to make it easier to pronounce. Phoebe embroiders "HITTY" on her chemise so all her future owners will know what to call her.
• In Honor Harrington, Prescott David Tremaine apparently started to be called "Scotty" on his first day at Saganami Island, and twenty two years and innumerable adventures later he's still never referred any other way.
• "Mullet Fingers" from Carl Hiaasen's Hoot. He doesn't have egregious amounts of 80s hair growing from his knuckles or anything. He got his nickname by being a Friend to All Living Things and having reflexes fast enough to catch a mullet fish with his bare hands.
• In Hover Car Racer, Jason's autistic little brother and navigator is referred to only as the Bug.
• How to Fly with Broken Wings: Sasha's dad is a former rock star. His real name is Kevin, but he goes by his stage name, Fox.
• Foxface from The Hunger Games. Katniss gives her the name on the basis that she looks like a fox, and we never learn what her real name is. More than half the tributes are never named.
• I Become Shadow: Rennes Sharpe goes by "Ren" for the whole book.
• Many of the characters in I, Claudius are only known by their nicknames (for example, "Caligula" and "Castor"). Roman naming customs were very unimaginative, so several people might have identical or almost-identical names; nicknames make it much easier than trying to figure out which of the eight or nine "Drusus"es someone might be talking about.^note Truth in Television; the ancient Romans made use of nicknames for just that reason. In the books, the narrator will usually mention the real name before telling you that that guy will just be known as "Castor" from then on; in the TV series, they generally didn't even do that.
• There are several cases of this in the Inkheart books: We are told that "Capricorn" is a name he gave himself, but we never know what his real name is. The same with Orpheus (who gets it double since Farid calls him only "Cheeseface"). The Magpie's real name is Mortola, but she is very rarely refered to that way. "The Adderhead" and "the Laughing Prince/Prince of Sighs" are names given to them by their subjects. Also the Barn Owl, Nettle, Firefox, Sootbird, the Piper, Flatnose, Cockerell, Cloud-Dancer, and the Black Prince.
  • Even though it's never mentioned that he might have another name, Dustfinger could easily be an example of this. Since his world is full of regular names like Roxanne, Basta, and Minerva, it's probably safe to assume that this is a nickname rather than what his parents named him.
  • Mortimer is an interesting case of this. While everyone else calls him by his proper name, Dustfinger, Capricorn, and the other characters from Inkheart refuse to call him anything but "Silvertongue", which he doesn't like. He is also known only by a nickname to his daughter, Meggie, who "had never called her father anything but 'Mo'."
• Inkmistress:
  • Ina is mostly called this rather than her full name Invasya.
  • Hal is only called his full name Phaldon a couple times.
• Into the Drowning Deep: Tory is only called Victoria a couple times.
• Jaine Austen Mysteries: Jaine constantly refers to her ex-husband as "The Blob". Death of a Gigolo, where she and him briefly get back together, reveals his actual name to be Dickie Elliott.
• Inverted in Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth, in which Jennifer steadfastly ignores a teacher that calls her "Jenny" until she uses her proper name, Jennifer.
• Yo-less, Wobbler and Bigmac in the Johnny Maxwell Trilogy. When Johnny talks to Bigmac's social worker, it takes him a minute to remember that she'd know him as Simon.
• J.P. Beaumont: Acquaintances know his as "J.P.", but his friends and close associates call him "Beau". Almost no one uses his given names (Jonas Piedmont).
• Jude's eldest child in Jude the Obscure: his mother didn't bother to christen him and simply called him "Little Father Time". Jude and Sue more or less do the same thing.
• In the Judy Moody books and the associated Stinky Moody spin-offs, Stink's real name is James, but this is only very rarely mentioned.
• Most of the main characters in Kea's Flight:
  • Karen Anderson, aka Kea
  • Zachary Drazil, aka Draz
  • Lucille Carlson, aka Lefty
  • Erin Blartner-Lowell, aka Blaro
  • Benjamin Parker-Smith, aka Beep
  • Todd Nealson, the chairman of the Board, goes by Nail because he connects the Board to everything else.
• The Key To Rondo: Pretty much everyone in Rondo has a nickname, sometimes referring to their occupation or role in society. This is well justified by the fact that the Blue Queen can control the actions of anyone of whom she knows the birth name.
• Kill time or die trying has many of these. Talk-Shout, Indy, Kevin and even the main character who is addressed only as Brad within the club.
• Grey in Knights of the Borrowed Dark is very rarely called 'Graham'. Helps that Grey is a Meaningful Name.
• Kantorka (means: daughter of the cantor) in Krabat. Fortunately, because I Know Your True Name also applies (the villain is an evil wizard).
• Pagan in Shirley Conran's Lace. Her real name is Jennifer, but she grew up with a nanny who called her "you little pagan" when she misbehaved. Her family eventually started calling her Pagan and the nickname stayed with her throughout her life.
• Last Night at the Telegraph Club:
  • Lily is only rarely called Lilian or Li Li, as the full version of her name is in English and Mandarin.
  • The same goes for Kath, full name Kathleen.
  • Drag king Tommy Andrews mostly goes by this instead of her legal name Theresa Scafani.
• Cameron "Buck" Williams from Left Behind. This may be because he corrects anyone who tries to use his actual name. One character's insistence on using his real name rather than "Buck, because he bucks against journalistic conventions" is used as evidence of her unsympathetic nature.
  • Legit versions of this trope in that series include Albie (who is named for his hometown Al Basrah) and Razor.
• Cosette in Les Misérables. Her real name is Euphrasie, but everybody calls her by the nickname her mother gave her, Cosette.
• In Little Women, three of the four March sisters almost always go by nicknames: "Meg" (Margaret), "Jo" (Josephine – too "sentimental" a name for her taste), and "Beth" (Elizabeth). Meanwhile, Theodore Laurence is always called "Laurie," or else "Teddy" by Jo. All their children go by nicknames too. Meg and John Brooke's twins, named Margaret and John after their parents, are called "Daisy" and "Demi" (short for "demijohn"), while their younger sister, who first appears in the sequel, is named Josephine, but called "Josie." Jo and Professor Bhaer's two sons are "Rob" (Robert) and "Teddy" (Theodore), while Amy and Laurie's daughter, named Elizabeth after Beth, is also called "Beth" in early childhood, but "Bess" as she gets older.
• Livvie Owen Lived Here: Georgia, Livvie's best friend in the special ed classroom, goes by G, both because it's easier for her to pronounce and because G is her favorite letter.
• One of the main characters in Lord of the Flies is known only as Piggy, a nickname he hates. His real name is never revealed.
• The Rat in The Lost Prince. His real name, Jem Ratcliffe, is mentioned once when he first introduces himself to the protagonist, and then never again.
• Kris Longknife's great-grandfather is universally known as "Trouble". Readers don't even learn his first name (Terrence) until the fourth book.
• In the classic children's novel The Machine Gunners the son of the cemetery keeper is known only as "Cem". (A throwaway line in one of the sequels reveals that he inherited his father's position and was still known as "Cem" a good thirty years later.)
• Malazan Book of the Fallen: Most professional soldiers in the series are known only by their nicknames, typically assigned during basic training. Examples include Whiskeyjack, Fiddler, Hedge, Bottle, Stormy, Halfpeck, Iron Bars and many more.
• In the Sci-Fi novel Malevil, La Menou's actual name is never stated, and she goes by her nickname which means "tiny".
• Every character in The Man Who Brought the Dodgers Back to Brooklyn calls Daniel Malone "Squat", a nickname he picked up while playing as the catcher in neighborhood baseball games as a kid. He points out in the narration that the only person who calls him by his real name is his mother.
• Juliet Marillier:
  • Son of the Shadows: Known as the Painted Man to most, Chief to his men, he has forgotten his own name, until Liadan (the only one to give him an actual name) reminds him.
  • In Daughter of the Forest, it's the other way around. Everyone knows the male protagonist as Hugh of Harrowfield, except for those closest to him, who call him Red. More straightforward in the sequel, when he has moved to Ireland: everyone calls him Iubdan ("the little man"), so that hardly anyone remembers that he's actually a Briton called Hugh.
• A Master of Djinn: Siti's legal name turns out to be Abla, but Fatma only uses this when visiting her family. Otherwise she's only called or thought of as Siti.
• The Melendy Quartet features recurring character Evangeline Cuthbert-Stanley, the family housekeeper who's always known as Cuffy.
• Pumpkin in Memoirs of a Geisha. Chiyo/Sayuri gave her the nickname within a week of meeting her, never mentions her given name, and goes on to mention that it continues to stick even after she takes a new name as a geisha. Which must really suck for Pumpkin, because she spends the latter portion of the book hating Sayuri's guts and deliberately sabotaging her chance with the man of her dreams, since she and Chiyo were forced rivals as girls and Pumpkin's life became very dismal as a result.
• The main villain of The Mental State has gone to great lengths to erase his previous identity. His favourite pseudonym is 'Saif Dhu Hadin', which roughly means 'Double-edged Sword'. Most people just call him 'Saif'.
• In the Midnight Louie books, Max Kinsella's real name is technically Michael Aloysius Xavier Kinsella, but good grief. It's not much a surprise he took the first of each his names and combined them to become the "Mystifying Max".
• In Midnight's Children there is Saleem's sister, the Brass Monkey. She gets the nickname for being a Fiery Redhead, but we aren't told her birth name.
• Many characters in the Mistborn trilogy apply, although some do go have real names mentioned or used at some point or another. Breeze intentionally uses only his nickname to hide that he is actually a nobleman. Clubs is named for his leg injury, although his apprentices occasionally refer to him as Master Cladent. His nephew Spook, however, is a full example. Kelsier gives him the nickname name "Spook" because it's easier to say than his name, "Lestibournes". He eventually stops using his given name in favor of the one he has earned, but it turns out Lestibournes is also a nickname, meaning roughly "I was abandoned" in his slang. His real name doesn't appear anywhere in the series. Word of God confirms it’s Jedal, after his abusive father, explaining why he doesn’t like using it.
• Seth's friend H from More Than This. His real name is presumably "Harold", but it comes up exactly once and H promptly reminds the speaker not to call him Harold.
• Jace Wayland from The Mortal Instruments. Jace comes from the initials for Jonathan Christopher, which hardly anyone calls him. When his full name is revealed at the end of City of Bones, its significant because it makes Clary think he's her long-lost brother, who also had the initials J.C.
• Mouse (2017): Mouse's real name is Simon, but he never uses it, and corrects anyone who does.
• Sticky Washington in The Mysterious Benedict Society series. His real name is "George", so he insists on people referring to him only by the nickname because he doesn't feel that he can live up to the name of "George Washington". However, none of the officials at the Learning Institute for the Very Enlightened will use the nickname, because they feel that "if it isn't official, then it can't be real."
• Many characters in the The Neapolitan Novels are most often referred by nicknames, though two stands over the others:
  • Elena, the narrator and main protagonist, is almost exclusively referred to as Lenù.
  • Raffaella Cerullo is an important character, but you'd be forgiven to forget that because her name is used exactly once in the entire series, when Elena's narration explains that everyone else calls her Lina. Elena instead calls her Lila, an exclusive nickname that indicates their extremely close friendship, to the point the narration states that if Elena switched to Lina it would be a clear sign their friendship is over for good.
• Neuromancer has the capsule hotel known only as ”Cheap Hotel”. Everyone assumes it has another name, but no-one knows what it is, and the sign outside says ”Cheap Hotel”, so ”Cheap Hotel” it is.
• In Nevermoor, Corvus goes through so many assistants, he doesn't even bother learning their names anymore. He just calls them "Left" and "Right" based on what side of him they stand on (which must make mobility at important events something of a pain). His daughter Morrigan makes an Obligatory Joke about it.
  Corvus: [to one of his assistants] Good lord, you're right.
  Morrigan: [thinking] Nope. He's Left.
• Nina Tanleven: In The Ghost in the Third Row, "Pop" is the old man who keeps the Grand Theater in shape and does prop work for the plays. His real name isn't given until after he dies saving Nine, when it's revealed that he's Edward Parker, who'd vowed to stay in the theater until he could be reunited with his dead love Lily Larkin, the titular ghost of the book.
• Nory Ryans Song: Patch's real name is Patrick (which Nory suggested to her parents while her mother was pregnant), but everyone only calls him "Patch."
• The Occupation Saga: Between Worlds Three:
  • Jason's CO for the book, Colonel "Cleff", is an Insectoid Alien whose real name is unpronounceable to most species.
  • The "Roaches" got their name from the look of the Mini-Mecha they build to move about and interact with the world. Their own name for their species is "Ulnus".
• Neil Gaiman's short story October in the Chair features a boy who was bullied by his twin older brothers. They had nicknamed him the Runt and everyone called him this.
• Old Kingdom: In Sabriel, Touchstone can't initially remember his name after the title character releases him from the ship's figurehead he was turned into, so he uses the "fool's name" Mogget dubs him even though he doesn't like it that much. It isn't until Abhorsen that his real name is revealed to be Torrigan.
• In The Once and Future King, the Kid Hero of the first part of the story is known as the Wart. That's what he's called and nobody ever uses his name. Until he becomes King Arthur.
• The two main characters in Charlotte Gingras's Ophélie never mention their actual names and only go by their self-given aliases, Ophelia and Ulysses.
• Most of the Firebirds players from Out of Position are only referred to by their nicknames. Charm and Jaws' real names, for example, have yet to be revealed.
• The Pants Project: Liv, a closeted trans boy, hates being called by his full first name, Olivia, because it's too feminine.
• Paradise Lost: None of the fallen angels (besides maybe Satan) are given names and are only referred to by the names humanity will give them as they worship them over the centuries. Although, Gabriel refers to a few of the demons by their human-given names before any of their worshippers even born, so who knows.
• Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Percy Jackson is known by his nickname to the extent that anyone calling him "Perseus" is often a sign that they're not what they seem. Mr. D the camp director is a benign example, but it's mostly monsters.
• The Phantom of the Opera's real name (or at least the one he adopted) is Erik, but aside from the Persian, Christine and Raoul he is only known as the Angel of Music, Opera Ghost or just “The Ghost”. The Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical in particular only refers to the titular antagonist as: “The Phantom” with the name “Erik” getting Adapted Out, leading to surprise from fans who watched the musical first and are shocked at the fact the Phantom has a name at all.
  • The Persian himself is simply known as “The Persian”, the Phantom calls him “Daroga” which is means chief of police in Hindi. His real name is never revealed.
• Not really a nickname, but Reuven Malter in Chaim Potok's books seems to use his Hebrew name almost exclusively; his "real" first name is Robert, but he's only seen using a few times, and only when dealing with people who aren't Jewish.
• Peekay in The Power of One has some typical English name, but it's never used.
• Presidential: Connie is never called Constance by her loved ones, and it's only mentioned to be her given name a couple times.
• Near the beginning of The Price of the Stars, Beka Rosselin-Metadi is rescued from assassins by an old man who (aside from the blasters and skill with them) strikes her as an instructor in languages and deportment at a finishing school, so she starts calling him "Professor". Despite revealing his position as Armsmaster to House Rosselin, he makes no attempt to correct her (or anyone else) nor provide another name save at the end of a hand-written letter given to her some months after his death.
  The letter closed with a line of symbols in a script and language Beka didn't recognize. It took several seconds, staring at the page with blurring eyes, before she understood that the alien symbols were a signature.
• Until the 7th book, JP in The Princess Diaries series was known only as "The Guy Who Hates It When They Put Corn in the Chili". Also, the protagonist Mia's full name is actually Amelia.
• This is the default state for elves in the Quantum Gravity 'Verse. True Names are very powerful, and so an elf will be known by the last part (usually one-syllable) of his or her name to absolutely everyone except close friends, who will use the first half. This is subtle foreshadowing of the fact that Sarasilien is not the elf's real name — even though he only has a business relationship with most of his coworkers, he still tells all of them his "real" name.
• Quarters: Vree's full name, Vireyda, is rarely used. Bannon's isn't revealed to be Albannon until the finale of Fifth Quarter.
• The Queen of Ieflaria: Adale's full name is Adaleheidis, though only her father uses it.
• Rabble Starkey: Rabble's real first name is Parable Ann, but for the most part goes by Rabble. Sweet Ho's full first name was Sweet Hosannah. Rabble called her grandmother Gonmie and only later when she asked her mother how to spell the name did she realize it was Naomi.
• The Railway Series and its Animated Adaptation, Thomas & Friends give us Montague, better known as Duck, a nickname given to him by engines who say he waddles. While he doesn't really, he likes Duck better than Montague.
• Beezus from the Ramona Quimby series isn't actually named Beezus, she's named Beatrice. Many of the books don't even tell you that! She's named after their mother's younger sister, whom both girls adore. One of the books mentions that she got this nickname from Ramona's toddler mispronunciation of Beatrice. She usually seems to be fine with being called so, although there was one episode in another book where some boys at the park took advantage of the fact that it rhymes with "Jesus", and from then on she insisted on being called "Beatrice" in public and only called "Beezus" at home.
• In The Raven Cycle, the main character Blue's Disappeared Dad is almost always referred to as "Butternut" by the rest of her family.
  • In the second book, we are introduced to The Gray Man. As a hitman, he understandably likes to keep his real name a secret.
• Razorland Trilogy: Fade's given first name is revealed midway through the first book (Enclave), but his family name is never given (which he knows because he was raised by his father). He refuses to respond to his given name after being taken in by the College enclave.
• Redwall's vermin are often named with uncomplimentary descriptions of their physical features (possibly reaching its peak in Triss with the briefly-mentioned "Fatty" and "Stinky"). In Loamhedge the fan assumption that these were nicknames was made explicit, as the adolescent Redd is told he will soon receive his "proper vermin name".
  • Urgan Nagru says that he took his official name from the wolf Urgan, whom he claims to have killed and whose pelt he wears. His original name is never revealed. Played with in the Official Fanfiction University, when his wife Silvamord threatens to tell the students what his real name is.
• Renegades:
  • Phobia's real identity is unknown. At one point, Nova wonders if the nickname isn't his actual first name.
  • In-universe, no-one knows the true identity of the villain Nightmare (in contrast the other Anarchists), which is what lets Nova infiltrate the Renegades.
• The Reynard Cycle: Even though the Calvarians snicker at the concept, and know Reynard's real name, they consistently call him "The Fox" when referring to him.
• In Rumble Fish, the Motorcycle Boy is only known by this nickname and even his teachers use it. His younger brother is one of the few in the neighborhood that even knows his, unstated, real name.
  • Ditto Two-Bit Matthews in Hinton's The Outsiders; Ponyboy, who narrates the story, explains that Two-Bit's real name is Keith, but everyone, including teachers, has called him Two-Bit to the point that they have all forgotten what his real name is.
• In the Ryanverse, Jack (Sr.'s) wife Cathy is only rarely referred to by her real name of Caroline.
• Sacré Bleu features the Colorman, who tells people that his first name is "The". You find out later that he was born in 38,000 BC and his name was Two Grunts and a Shrug, which translates to "Poop on a Stick". You can't really blame him.
• In Shadow (2010), the titular character doesn't know her real name, so she's just called Shadow by the citizens of the castle, emphasizing her role as Queen Audrey's , well, shadow. We later discover her real name: Audrey.
• Give 'Em Hell and Preacher of The Shadow Campaigns are almost always referred to be those monikers. Marcus notes that he sometimes forgets that Preacher has a name that's not "Preacher", and when Janus asks for Captain Vahkerson, it takes everyone a while to figure out he's talking about Give 'Em Hell.
• In Shaman of the Undead Brittle is rarely called by his surname, Kruszyński, and only Redhead (who herself is an example) ever calls him by his name, and even that happened perhaps once. Even when we're looking through his eyes, narrative still calls him Brittle.
• Shatter the Sky: Sev is only called this usually. It turns out that his full name is Vesper Severin. He was a fugitive in hiding, therefore only going by this makes sense.
• Flick in Jean Shepherd's short stories, of which A Christmas Story is the most famous adaption. He was based on a real-life childhood friend of Shepherd's whose last name was Flickinger.
• Bubber from Shine Shine Shine is really named Robert, but no one calls him that.
• In "The Sixty-Two Curses of Caliph Arenschadd", the protagonist meets a boy who's reluctant to tell her his real name, so she dubs him 'Tumpkin' on the grounds that she has to call him something. At the end of the story, she finds out who he really is, but the reader doesn't get to learn his real name, because she keeps calling him by the name they became friends by.
• In the Skyrider series by Melisa Michaels, Skyrider considers this a problem. She thinks it's a cheesy, Embarrassing Nickname, but few people actually know her real name.
• Y.T. in Snow Crash. At first you might assume that they're her initials, but they're actually short for Yours Truly.
• Many of the characters in Someone Else's War, most prominently Lieutenant Panga and Lazy.
• Something to Talk About: Jo's full first name turns out to be Josephine, but only her father calls her that.
• In the Jackie French novel Somewhere Around the Corner, Young Jim mishears Barbara when she says her name, leading to her being known as "Bubba" to pretty much everybody in the book, despite her introducing herself as "Barbara" several times (even saying "It's Barbara, really" at one point).
• Song at Dawn: Estela is not the first musician to hide behind a 'songstress's name'. Even after she's publicly married as 'Roxane de Montburn' she still goes by 'Estela'.
• Many characters in A Song of Ice and Fire have nicknames, some of which are self-styled and others less so. Peasants generally don't care about the real names of other peasants, which leads to some people being known exclusively by their nicknames, such as Lommy Greenhands, a mook named Shitmouth, and most famously Hot Pie, among others. Arya becomes this once when traveling to Braavos. She would have invented a new identity at this point, but everyone just called her "Salty", so she went with it.
  • In Tales of Dunk and Egg, we have the inversion of Dunk of Flea Bottom. His young squire Egg(short for Prince Aegon) asks if his name is short for Ser Duncan. Dunk briefly thinks that he's been called Dunk for so long he's not sure if it's a shorter version of his name or his true name itself. Nevertheless he decides to style himself, Ser Duncan the Tall.
• In John Grisham's Sooley, one of his few non-legal stories, the protagonist is one Samuel Souleymane, a South Sudanese refugee who in the span of one season went from the end of the bench at a school in one of the weakest NCAA Division I conferences to the face of college basketball. The title of the book is what everyone calls him.
• So This is Ever After: Arek and his companions had no idea the Vile One's real name was Barthly until after he died.
• The Southern Reach Trilogy:
  • "Ghost Bird" is the nickname given the biologist by her late husband and the only moniker she is known by other than "the biologist". Later, her clone refuses to be called by anything other than Ghost Bird as well.
  • While Control's name is actually given right away in Authority, he asks everyone to call him Control, which remains in place for the remainder of the trilogy.
• Eddie Parks from The Speed of Sound dislikes being called Edward, as he says several times.
• Hawk, in the Spenser series. On book has him tell Spenser his actual name, which clashes with the two other names he went by when they both were boxers. Spenser is surprised.
• The Finn from William Gibson's Sprawl Trilogy.
• Watch in the Spooksville series. His real name is never revealed and it's implied he might not even remember it. There's also the titular town itself, which is actually called Springville, but is only called Spooksville by the kids who know of the supernatrual activity that goes on there.
• Star Wars Legends:
  • Several characters in the X-Wing Series. Rogue Squadron has Hobbie Klivian, whose real name is Derek, but no one ever uses it. Wraith Squadron has the most examples — their full names are in the Dramatis Personae and usually get mentioned the first time they're introduced, but you wouldn't know that Face, Grinder, Piggy, and Runt had any other names, otherwise.
  • Mitth'raw'nuruodo, aka Thrawn. He went with the short version to make it easier, and it stuck. In his culture, core names are only supposed to be used by friends and family, but he doesn't seem to mind; presumably the over-familiarity is preferable to people continually mangling the pronunciation. One particular mangling comes from Vicelord Siv Kav in the form of "Mitthrawdo", no matter how many times he's corrected. Then again, Siv Kav really doesn't like Thrawn, so this is likely intentional.
• Ranger in the Stephanie Plum books. His full name is Ricardo Carlos Manoso.
• Stinger: Curt Lochett only ever refers to his late wife by his pet Affectionate Nickname for her, Treasure.
• In The Stormlight Archive, the character Rock is actually named an overly long Name That Unfolds Like Lotus Blossom in another language that nobody can pronounce. Also Shallan's spren has a real name that contains a lot of numbers and is hard for humans to say, so she just calls him Pattern. While most of the main character refer to Kaladin as Kaladin, other soliders and people who doesn't know almost exclusively call him "Stormblessed", which eventually becomes his actual house name too.
• Swan's Braid & Other Tales of Terizan: The Thieves' Guild's three Tribunes (leaders), keep their names secret, going by Tribune One, Two and Three instead.
• Swan and Sister in Swan Song; Swan's real name is Sue Wanda, but Sister doesn't actually remember her real name.
• In John Steinbeck's novel Sweet Thursday, a brothel keeper named Flora is known only as "Fauna".
• Tales of the Pack: Lexie's full name is Alexis. She's only called that a few times however.
• Tatu and Patu: The 20th book reveals that "Tatu" and "Patu" are nicknames, their real names being Touhukarbonaatti and Poutapilvi.
• Teen Power Inc.: Sunny. Her real name is Alice, but not even newspaper articles about the gang ever mention this. Someone involved in a possible paranormal event in Breaking Point knowing her real name is treated as possible proof that the haunting is real.
• Sackers from the Star Trek novel The Three Minute Universe consider getting names an honor, especially if they come from alien races, no matter how ridiculous they may be. This leads to Sackers being named everything from Blue to Misterma'am to Orangejuiceandwodka being worn with pride. Lampshaded when Chekov named one, then asked what her mother would’ve called her before she got her nickname, only for the Sacker in question to hesitate and say that everyone will call her by that name now.
• In The Thirteenth Tale, John-the-dig's legal name is John Digence, but Vida insists that if you really knew him, you knew that John-the-dig was his real name.
• In C. S. Lewis's Till We Have Faces, the princesses' Greek tutor is known only as the Fox, due to his red hair (which goes completely gray early on in the story). Only once does a character refer to him by his given name, Lysias.
  • he also gives both princesses Greek nicknames. While Orual, whose nickname is Maia, is primarily known by her own name, Istra is known as Psyche throughout the story.
• J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth:
  • Dwarves in The Lord of the Rings don't tell their names to outsiders (their real names are in the Dwarvish language, which is itself secret). Instead, they all go by use-names borrowed from the nearby humans — like "Thorin" or "Gimli".
  • Ents: Entish being what it is, an Ent's full name is essentially the story of their entire life, described in detail — and since Ents are The Ageless, that makes for long and rambling names. Most Ents use fragments of their name rendered into other languages for dealing with "hasty" people — i.e. "Treebeard" and "Skinbark."
  • Samwise, Meriadoc and Peregrin are all three known more simply as Sam, Merry and Pippin respectively. It’s usually a sign of danger for Pippin when the ever loath to Took foolishness Gandalf refers to him as Peregrin.
  • In Bree, Aragorn is known exclusively as "Strider." Not that he wants his true identity shouted from the rooftops, but this nickname ain't exactly flattering. Nonetheless he adopts it (translated into High Elven as Telcontar) for his dynastic name... for some reason.
  • Gandalf’s name is actually a moniker given to him by the men of Arnor, his real divine Maia name Olórin is not brought up outside The Silmarillion and the appendices. The elves refer to him by their Affectionate Nickname of “Mithrandir” (meaning “Grey Pilgrim”) a lot. Likewise Curumo and Aiwendil are exclusively referred to by their wizard names of Saruman and Radagast respectively.
  • Túrin in The Silmarillion and The Children of Húrin spent his whole life fruitlessly trying to escape the curse Morgoth put on his whole family. He figured avoiding his real name would help, so every time he fled from his ruined life to go live someplace new, he introduced himself only with some unpleasant nickname he'd just made up on the spot: Neithan ("the Wronged"), Gorthol ("Dread Helm"), Agarwaen ("Bloodstained"), Wild Man of the Woods, and finally Turambar ("Master of Doom"). The Elves in Nargothrond, unsurprisingly not liking Agarwaen, nicknamed him the more flattering Adanedhel ("Elf-Man"), Thurin ("the Secret"), and Mormegil ("Black-Sword") instead. But to his eternal irritation, his real name wasn't so secret after all.
  • Melkor and Mairon are almost exclusively referred to by their Names To Run Away From Very Fast “Morgoth” and “Sauron” which are insulting monikers in elvish Sindarin meaning “Black Foe” and “The Abhorred” respectively.
  • Elves are an odd case. To summarize:
    • Most of them have two names, a mother-name ^note given by their mother and a father-name ^note given by their father. Which name they're commonly known by appears to be a matter of personal preference.
    • Then, if they were given Quenya names, they Sindarinised those names, so "Tyelkormo" becomes "Celegorm", "Carnistir" becomes "Caranthir" and "Curufinwë" becomes "Curufin", to take some of the sons of Fëanor as examples.
    • And in some cases they choose not to be called by either their mother-name or their father-name, and take a new name that they chose for themselves or were given by someone. For example, Finarfin's only daughter decided not to be called "Artanis" (her father-name) or "Nerwen" (her mother-name), but instead called herself "Galadriel", a direct translation of "Altáriel", the name her husband Celeborn gave her.
    • And so, in a way, every Elf is only known by their nickname. Confused yet?
• In Too Bright to See, trans boy Bug hates his legal name, presumably because it's too girly, and never mentions it.
• The Underland Chronicles: Boots' real name is only mentioned in Gregor the Overlander, and the crawlers refer to her exclusively as "the princess".
• Universal Monsters: Joe Motley. It's not until late in book 6 that his full first name, Joel, is revealed.
• The Orange Man in Venus Prime is never given a real name.
• Villains by Necessity:
  • Sam's full name turns out to be Samalander, though it's only said a couple times. Most other people didn't even know about it until he disclosed this.
  • Arcie, though it isn't until the last chapter that the party learns that Arcie isn't his name, it's his initials, R.C., for Reinheart Corallis MacRory.
• The Wandering Inn: The most terrifying Necromancer the world has ever seen is only known by his nickname, The Necromancer — with minor exceptions.
• War and Peace, being a Russian novel, is rife with examples: Natalya 'Natasha' Ilyinichna Rostova, Sophia 'Sonya' Alexandrovna Rostova, Pytor 'Pierre' Cyrillovich Bezukov, Feodor 'Fedya' Dolokov, Nikolai 'Nicolenka' Illyich Rostov, Pytor 'Petya' Illyich Rostov, Elena 'Helene' Vasilyevna Kuragina, Ippolit Vasilyevich 'Hippolyte' Kuragin, and Anna 'Annette' Pavlovna Scherer are all known almost exclusively by their nicknames, sometimes even in formal company. This was very commonplace in Russia, especially in cases where a parent had the same name as their child, such as Natasha and her mother, who is called Natalia.
• In the Warrior Cats series, the Tribe of Rushing Water cats all have long names in a Name That Unfolds Like Lotus Blossom style, so they go by the first word of their name — "Bird Who Rides The Wind" is "Bird", for example, and "Jagged Rock Where Heron Sits" is "Jag". There are a couple Tribe of Endless Hunting ancestors named Fall and Slant that are mentioned in Sign of the Moon whose full name isn't mentioned, so even fans only know them by their nicknames.
• In West Meadows Detectives, one of Myron and Hajrah's classmates in Room 15 is a girl named Danielle who only goes by Glitch because she's so good with computers.
• Where the Crawdads Sing:
  • Catherine Clark goes by Kya, a childhood mispronuncaition.
  • After her siblings leave, she can only remember their nicknames. When she learns to read as a teenager, she learns their real names from the family guidebook: Missy is Mary Helen, Murph is Napier Murphy, Mandy is Amanda Margaret, and Jodie is Jeremy Andrew.
• Princess Candacis in White as Snow is almost always called Coira, a name her nurse gave her, to the point that her maids instruct a doctor to call her Coira because she won't know who he's talking to if he calls her Candacis.
• Boots, Bronx, Ducky, and Frosty from The White Rabbit Chronicles.
• In the Indian novel The White Tiger: Vitiligo-Lips and the landlords.
• The Wild Way Home: Charlie's friend Beaky hates her real name, Beatrice Bird, and never uses it.
• ''Winnie the Pooh': Winnie's name is a nickname for Edward Bear. For that matter, in the Disney series especially, hardly anyone ever calls him "Winnie," instead calling him "Pooh" or "Pooh Bear," and occasionally "Winnie the Pooh."
• In Wise Child, Juniper is called such because she uses the plant often for her remedies. Her real name is revealed to be Ninnoc. This also applies to Wise Child, as her nickname is a teasing word for an Adorably Precocious Child that would be translated as "wise child" in English. Unlike Juniper, though, her real name is never revealed.
• Wonder Woman: Warbringer: Nim. Her full name, Poornima Chaudhary, is mentioned exactly once.
• In Wylder's Hand, the Vicar's infant son is only ever referred to by his parents' pet name for him, which is "Fairy".
• Xandri Corelel's real first name is Alexandria, but virtually nobody has used it since she cut off contact with her Abusive Parents.
• In Daniel Pinkwater's Young Adult Novel, the protagonist goes by his nom de guerre, Charles the Cat, and the other Wild Dada Ducks do likewise.
• In Zen And The Art Of Faking It, San falls in love with a girl named Woody, and only realizes that this isn't her real name when an adult refers to her as Emily halfway through the book.
  • This could also fall under Meaningful Rename since she chose the name herself and rejected the name her mother gave her. This happens again toward the end and reverses the first when she starts going by her real name again.
• The folk in The Folk of the Air can be controlled with their names, so they endeavor to keep at least part of their names hidden. However, Jude's circle of spies also go by codenames to protect their identities. While we learn Bomb and Ghost's names (given name for the former, true name of the latter) over the course of the trology, senior spy Roach's name is never revealed.

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