Hearth High - The Teachers
- CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR...Books One, Two, Three, and Four
Principal Duckworth
Hearth High’s principal—colloquially known as “The Duck”—was originally Lucy’s nemesis and Book One’s secret villain. You can see some typical wicked authoritarian tropes reflected his painful thinness and that his skin is “grey-tinged” and “sallow”. Whenever Lucy breaks the rules he always seems to be there. He is a fan of Sebastian Grieve, marking him as a nerd in Lucy’s mind, and has three small yappy fluffy dogs, surely the mark of true evil!
In my original vision of Book One Duckworth was revealed to be working with Writhen, then was killed in the final confrontation in the Hearth High hall. But when Mr Twist turned out true to his name it allowed me to repurpose Duckworth’s role and keep him around as a constant source of tension for our lead.
I’m very cruel to poor Duckworth. In Book One, he and his dogs are transformed into monsters and when healed he awakens, completely naked, in the wrecked school hall with no memory of what happened. If Duckworth feels a wee bit one-note in The Mythic and Book Two it’s because he’s the stand-in for every bureaucratic, haughty school authority character—there are a lot of them in every kind of media!—many of them equally one-dimensional.
In Book Three, Duckworth is vomited on by Mr Knight when he drunkenly turns up to a school concert. But later he shows Lucy kindness and generosity, my way of showing that he realised for the first time just how difficult she has had it at home. It took me a while but hopefully I demonstrated that Duckworth might have been a pompous authoritarian, but he wasn’t without empathy. That is currently his last appearance but, rest assured, we will see him again.
His surname is the dorkiest sounding name I could find. Apologies to anyone with that surname, no disrespect intended! Or maybe there’s a little disrespect intended… Equally, I suspect I subconsciously aped the name “Slugworth” from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory—it’s the same pattern, name of a creature + “worth”.
His first name is Brad, which felt to me a hyper-masculine name that contrasted starkly with his weasel-like character.
The Faculty
Back when Hearth High formed the main setting for The Mythic Series, I decided all the side-character teachers would be named after deities from various cultures. I’m fascinated by myths of all types, but especially the different pantheons. I’m always looking for opportunities in the books to add in references to them.
Some of these teachers had their roles severely reduced when Hearth High’s own role was cut back. However, I still managed to slip in a few of my favourites.
Mrs Binbeal
Introduced in Book Two, Mrs Binbeal is the Biology teacher known as the “freak of science”. She is three-foot-tall with a half-foot beehive that is “a marvel of architecture and engineering” according to Amber. Lucy thinks her hairdo is “pumped out of a machine fresh each morning, just like soft-serve ice cream” which I think is one of the best turns of phrase I’ve ever written.
Binbeal is shown to be kind and brave—when the cast in the vivisection instructional movie come to malignant life she bravely shields the children, ultimately using a chair to take out one of the attackers. She makes a brief appearance in Book Three during the parent-teacher evening and is mentioned in Book Four.
Binbeal is from Australian Aboriginal mythology and is the god of rainbows. I love the sound of his name and that they have a god of rainbows!
Ms Kresnik
Mr Prajapati
Another teacher mentioned in passing during Book Three, Mr Prajapati is Lucy’s Technology teacher. He is quiet and shy—he and Lucy simply sit in silence when Mr Knight fails to turn up to a teacher-student session.
Prajapati is a Hindu deity, known as the “lord of creatures”, governing animals (and male sex organs!). Once more, it was the sound of Prajapati’s name that drew me to it, it’s very melodic.
Mr Mafui'e
Appearing in Book Four, Mr Mafui’e is Lucy’s English teacher. A serious man with a booming voice, he is fond of read-throughs of plays in his class. It’s hinted he is also a wee bit vain as he has a habit of drawing the meatiest role for himself—this is what results in him being transformed into King Lear during an attack of arcana upon Hearth.
Mafui’e is the Samoan god of earthquakes. He was the keeper of fire in Samoan myth but loses a battle with the demi-god Tiʻitiʻi who shares fire with the Samoan people. This time I was drawn to the way the name looks on the page—I do love some additional punctuation in words!
