Names to conjure with – but not in a good way
POP star Ed Sheeran and his wife Cherry called their new baby Lyra after the heroine of Philip Pullman’s trilogy His Dark Materials. Which is a refreshing change from the lists published by the Office of National Statistics of the most popular names for girls last year which were: Olivia, Amelia, Isla, Ava, Mia, Isabella, Sophia, Grace, Lily and Freya. Top choices for boys were Oliver, George, Noah, Arthur, Harry, Leo, Muhammed, Jack, Charlie and Oscar.
Alexa has, apparently, taken a hit in the listings as parents didn’t want the Amazon smart speaker responding every time they called their daughter.
Choosing from literature has more appeal than picking the same as a thousand other people. But where would I look?
Swallows and Amazons was my favourite book as a youngster and, while some of the names of the children featured have stood the test of time without embarrassment, such as John, Susan and Roger, poor old Titty is very much stuck in 1930 and would be no good for a girl today.
Hemingway became a hero but I would not have chosen Ernest for a boy because of the 1960s connotations with short fat hairy legs and the Electronic Random Number
Indicating Equipment – Ernie for short – at the Premium Savings Bonds office in Lytham St Annes near where we lived.
My wife had the wonderful name of Antonietta Maria Colaluca when I met her, but she had a lucky escape as her parents had considered Scheherazade, a name from literature which means noble lineage, but sounds like panto. I was almost called Desmond. I don’t know why.
Not that we had much sense when we were awaiting the arrival of our first born. If a boy, I wanted to name him Che Guevara Kilcommons, after the hero of the Cuban revolution.
Thank goodness we had Siobhan, who inherited post natal daftness herself, when she phoned us from Ireland to say she was on her way to register our second grandson as Merlin McKee. Definitely from legend, literature and history, but it might not have been much fun in the playground. She reconsidered and we got Ruairi instead.
It doesn’t matter what name you pick, there will always be some confusion. My mother, in her later years, sat at the celebration for our first grandchild Lorcan, half a lager in one hand and shaking her head as she looked at him asleep in his pram. “It’s a mistake, you know. He’ll get laughed at, calling him Morecambe.”
Mind you, it would team up nicely with a bloke with short fat hairy legs.