okay, without looking it up...

[clauclauclaudia]

Does this usage of eponymous seem okay to you or not? Why?

[blah blah Chekhov on film] "Based on his eponymous 1891 novella, THE DUEL gives life to a classic Chekhovian tale...."

All right. Look it up if you want to, but let me know if you do.

I'm screening comments for a bit to get independent answers, but I'll unscreen them soonish. [Edit:

Comments

[neon_epiphany]

What, was the novella called "Anton Chekhov"? Because if not, it rubs me as wrong, wrong, WRONG.

exactly

[clauclauclaudia]

I had thought eponymous meant strictly "self-titled", like "Melissa Etheridge", the album. It's slightly broader than that, but it does mean something named after a particular person. I believe The Duel not to be a person. ;-)

[emmacrew]

This.

[jadasc]

Doesn't eponymous mean "named after the author or creator?"

not quite...

[clauclauclaudia]

Though that's certainly common usage these days. But it does mean named after a person.

[heatherbelles]

This is probably going to result in me embarrassing myself, but isn't 'eponymous' mean something along the name of 'bearing the same name'?

Like 'the film JFK focuses not on its eponymous President, but on the conspiracy theories surrounding the shooting' Or 'Russell Crowe plays the eponymous hero in Robin Hood/Gladiator'.

So, no the sentence wouldn't make sense - the film would have to be called Chekov, wouldn't it, for it to make sense?

I was tempted to look it up and check but haven't. I might once I've submitted this though!

almost!

[clauclauclaudia]

I think I would go with "titular" in the Crowe sentence. Eponymous means named for a specific person, and I'm not sure Gladiator qualifies. It certainly comes miles closer than The Duel, though.

[novalis]

I would give it at best a ? but probably a *. Eponymous things, I think, are named after a person or group. But ordinary usage is sloppy, and here it is clear that the 1891 novella is called "The Duel" rather than "Chekhov."

[bikergeek]

It does not. "Eponymous" is used to describe a work named for the author, e.g. "Boston's eponymous first album led off with the mega-hit 'More Than a Feeling,'" or "Jane Schmoe's eponymous memoir details the ins and outs of her more than three decades as a public-interest advocate on Capital Hill."

pretty close

[clauclauclaudia]

As I am definitionally in pedantic mode with this post, I'll give you a "correct but incomplete". ;-) See my earlier replies.

Re: pretty close

[bikergeek]

Interesting. I am now edified. :-)