Polls: Who is August W. Booth, and what does his name mean?

Update 9/20/12: This post contains polls taken before the show revealed the identity of the mysterious stranger August W. Booth. Now we know who he is — see the recap for episode 20, The Stranger.

Even though we now know August’s fairytale identity, there hasn’t yet been any explanation of what the name “August W. Booth” itself actually means. “August Wayne Booth” does anagram to “Snow, a tough beauty,” for whatever that is worth. At this point, I think the name is most likely a nod to Wayne Booth (creator of the term “unreliable narrator”), as a reference to the lies that August has told. But if so, what does “August” stand for?

Original post below:

These four polls are about August W. Booth, aka the Mysterious Stranger, aka the guy in the black leather jacket.

The choices in the polls come from some of the theories suggested in previous comment sections, plus a few more I added. I tried to give credit, where I could, to the first person who posted each theory. Thank you to everyone who shared their ideas!

If you have more ideas or want to elaborate on existing ones, please leave a comment below.
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Update March 4, 2012, 8:00 PM Eastern time (right before “Dreamy” aired)

The polls are now closed!

Summary of results:

A large majority of the voters (74 percent) thought that August W. Booth was the author of Henry’s original book.

The vote was closer on the question of whether August W. Booth will be Emma’s true love, with 57 percent voting yes and 43 percent voting no. This vote was neck-in-neck for several days, but then the “yes” votes started taking the lead in the end.

The poll asking “Who is August W. Booth?” had 12 choices. The clear winner is he is one of the Grimm brothers, which got 26 percent of the vote. Other popular answers are that he is Rumpelstiltskin’s son (15 percent), Henry, grown up (11 percent), “Other” (10 percent), someone who has always been hiding in Storybrooke (9 percent), and Pinocchio (8 percent).

The question about the meaning of August W. Booth’s name had eight choices. The top three answers were very close: That his name refers to Wayne Booth, the literary critic who coined the term “unreliable narrator” (24 percent); that it is an anagram (24 percent); and “Other” (23 percent). In fourth place was that “booth” (meaning a temporary shelter) referred to the wardrobe where the newborn Emma was placed (16 percent).

The comment section is still open, so please post if you’d like to discuss any of the theories.

I’m looking forward to finding out the answers and seeing how we did! In the PaleyFest panel discussion on March 4, the show’s producers said that we would find out the truth about Booth sometime this season.

The original comments, and more, are from the comments to the recap posts for Episode 10, Episode 11, and Episode 13.

I’ll close the polls to voting before the next episode begins (which will be on March 4), in case that episode contains any of the answers. Then we can see how good we are at guessing!