Ezra

Ezra is the biblical scribe who led the exiles back to Jerusalem and rebuilt the Temple's library — a priest-editor, essentially, whose name means help in Hebrew (Ezer, the verb to help). For most of the twentieth century the name belonged to poets and great-uncles: Ezra Pound, the brilliant, controversial American modernist who edited The Waste Land and ended up imprisoned for treason; Ezra Jack Keats, the children's book illustrator who gave us The Snowy Day; the occasional rabbi or Quaker.

Then in the 2010s, against almost no one's expectations, the name surged. Ezra entered the SSA top 100 in 2009, the top 50 in 2014, and the top 20 in 2020 — a climb that has been variously attributed to the band Vampire Weekend's frontman Ezra Koenig, to a broader hipster-vintage-biblical revival, and to the rise of three-letter or two-syllable boys' names with a slight bookish edge. Famous bearers include the actor Ezra Miller, the senator Ezra Taft Benson, the journalist Ezra Klein, and Ezra Furman, the indie singer-songwriter.

Two syllables with an unusual, whispery music — the z sitting where you don't expect it, the final a opening out — EZ-ra. The name pairs beautifully with other Old Testament or vintage names (Ezra and Asher, Ezra and Mae, Ezra and Wren) and reads as both ancient and entirely current. Nicknames are scarce; the name resists shortening. Vintage, literary, slightly bohemian, with the structural elegance of two open syllables. A name that suggests stacked books, strong coffee, a corduroy jacket, and a boy who listens before he speaks.