WHATS IN A NAME?

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 76, 30 March 1935, Page 3 (Supplement)

WHATS IN A NAME?

AN UNLOVELY LANGTRY.

(By HELEN GRIFFITHS.)

It matters not where one is born or what one's parents have been, but it is 'certainly desirable to have a suitable name. I can imagine a common-place o-irl who does not care twopence about books squirming at her name, Minerva, and an artist writhing under the name of Titmouse. Now suppose my name is Tennyson. I am sure I could write poems, wonderful sonnets, stunning epics, but my fue would laugh heartily at my efforts and make jokes over my every attemptat poetry——all because my name is Tennyson. , Suppose now my name is Gainsborough. Well, I like painting, blending colours, making cartoons and humorous sketches of my friends, but I destroy them all in despair. No one takes me seriously in my love of art, so I am an assistant in a fish shop and my name is Gainsborough. My name is Grace Darling. I loathe the sea, I am always seasick, and batliinnr "ives me cramps and shivers, but because of my illustrious name I hide my pet aversion. Now my name is Byron. I could write a splendid "Address to the Ocean," giving my experiences of mal de mer, etc., and I could write yards of blank verse, but no publisher would accept it. lhe public do not care fbr blank verse. \ have to earn my bread and butter, so I a 111 a hard-worked tvpiste in a tiny, dingy office, and my name in Byron. jlv name is Langtry. I have dreams of being like the fair Jersey Lily of classic countenance, but alas, in reality my nose is snub, my eyes are nondescript, my hair is red and my teeth are too prominent, and yet here [ am, I saddled with the name of Langtry.

jlv name is Irving. 1 love amateur acting, am sympathetic and have a fair ineinorv, but somehow I never get futtlier than prompter. If my name appeared on a playbill the malicious critics would say, "Mr.. Irving proved a weak imitation of his illustrious namesake." My miserable name, ye gods, i* Irving!

It is li rfter to lie born an ordinary i-liihl licarinu the <•<»tiinn>u-f il;»<-f na>"c ol .Smith, .Jones or Robinson', than to lie burdened with the name of a celebrity.