Well, of course we can call ourselves whatever we like, and if we want to be famous then giving ourselves a strange name might help to make us stand out in the crowd.
(Some of us have quite strange names to start with. I realise that. Who better?)
Using punctuation to decorate your name seems to be fashionable at the moment. We have will.i.am, P!nk, India.arie and of course that old favourite Hear'Say.
I don't know, though. Are the people who give themselves a novelty name the ones who fear they aren't quite charismatic enough to manage with an ordinary one?
I look back and find that Westward Ho!, named by Charles Kingsley, isn't the destination of choice for...well, most people. The Canadian town of Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha! isn't actually very famous outside Canada, either.
Or even quite possibly inside it.
Lastly, how about Nicholas Unless-Jesus-Christ-Had-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Barbon? He was named in 1640.
All those years, and he still hasn't really made it, has he.
Word To Use Today: punctuation. This word arrived in the 1600s from the Latin word punctuāre, to prick, from punctum, a prick, from pungere to puncture,
That Nicholas whatsit is amazing. And I thought it was only people who called their kids after entire football teams who were crazy! Seems it was ever thus.
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