Charactonym

A charactonym is a name which suggests the personality traits of a fictional character.

Examples:

Mara Jade from some of the Star Wars novels: "Mara" means "bitter" in Hebrew; when someone is jaded they are bitter; and bitter is a somewhat simplified description of her character in the first books she appears in.
Thomas Gradgrind, a character in Charles Dickens' novel Hard Times, subjects his students to a grinding discipline of "facts, facts, facts."
Squire Allworthy, in Henry Fielding's novel Tom Jones, is an exemplar of virtue.
Raskolnikov, the protagonist in Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment, raskolnik meaning 'schismatic'.
Mrs. Malaprop in Richard Sheridan's play The Rivals. She was known for misusing words with humorous results. From mal- (bad) + apropos (fitting).
Remus Lupin in J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series turns out to be a werewolf. His first name, "Remus", is an allusion to Romulus and Remus, the legendary twin founders of Rome who were raised by a wolf. His last name, "Lupin", can be traced to the Latin lupus meaning "wolf" (compare french "loup", or English "lupine", meaning "characteristic of or relating to wolves").

See also