What does "め" mean in this case?

Question

In the book I'm reading, a boy is looking for a tomato, he says "トマトめトマトめ どこ行ったの". What does "め" mean in this case?

Answer 1

め can be a pejorative suffix attached to nouns. It adds a negative meaning or emphasis of insult to that word.

This site shows a couple examples:

馬鹿め! (Bakame!/You idiot!)

Hence you could translate the sentence as: "Stupid tomato, stupid tomato! Where'd you go!". It is also a personification of that tomato, since the boy is addressing his tomato directly.

Some forum users use the word "dishonorific", but it doesn't seem to be a word that is generally accepted, known, or relevant.

As Eiríkr Útlendi pointed out in the comments, the correct term for the process of a neutral word becoming "rude" is called pejoration ("make worse"). The word itself is then called a pejorative. Pejoration is applied to トマト through the attachment of the pejorative suffix め. Another way to call it is "derogatory suffix".