A few things

[regshoe]

raremaleslashex works are revealed are this evening! I'm very excited, both to read my own gift (which has some pleasing tags) and to see what's around the collection. Reveals are at 9pm here, and I could stay up for them but I think I won't—I'll let it be a nice thing to look forward to first thing tomorrow.

If any of you are a) able to go to the theatre in the UK and b) fans of Dracula, this may be of interest: the National Theatre of Scotland are producing a new northeast Scottish-set adaptation, starring Danielle Jam (of the Kidnapped ensemble) as Mina and starting its tour of locations in Scotland and England next month. It looks pretty cool, though I don't think I will go—I'm not that into Dracula and it seems like it'll be a bit horror-ish.

I have cleared up a minor mystery: yes, Robert Louis Stevenson did pronounce his middle name like Lewis with an S, not like Louis without an S. I had heard both pronunciations and also knew that he'd changed the spelling from Lewis, and I was puzzled—why change your name to a different spelling of the same name that suggests a different pronunciation but then keep the same pronunciation anyway? But that's exactly what he did, as confirmed in this biography by a cousin, 'due, it is said, to a strong distaste, shared by his father, for a fellow-citizen, who bore the name in the form in which Lewis had received it.' So there you go. The NTS play, and Isobel McArthur in interviews, did pronounce it Louis, I'm not sure whether due to a lack of research (which was certainly not lacking in general) or because that's just the pronunciation that's most often used now. It's not clear why he dropped Balfour, his other middle name; according to the linked biography he 'loathed' his 'third initial', but surely he can't have loathed the name that much or he wouldn't have given it to Davie! Perhaps he just disliked having so many names—as someone also saddled with excessive middle names, I can sympathise with that.

Comments

[sanguinity]

Is "Louis" customarily pronounced "Louie" in the UK, then? Here it would be customarily pronounced "Lewis", which is the way I've always heard RLS's name said.

One of our local theaters is doing a "feminist" production of Dracula next season, which makes me head-tilt a bit: is this a return to the original novel (which is very loving and celebratory of its female characters), or is this something else entirely? But we liked the previous productions by the same team, and we do like the novel, so we're likely to go.

[regshoe]

Huh, yes it is—According to Wikipedia this is a general US/UK difference, but I did not know that.

I suppose interpreting the characters through ideas of modern feminism might produce something a bit different from the positive-but-lacking-that-context attitude of the novel? I don't know. I hope it's good!

[muccamukk]

Huh, I've always pronounced it Lou-EE. Oh well.

[regshoe]

LOU-ee is the usual pronunciation in the UK, and what I'd always assumed. I'll have to practice to stop pronouncing it that way!

[troisoiseaux]

Oh, man, that Dracula production looks so cool!! Alas, I am on the other side of the Atlantic...

[regshoe]

Alas for geography :(

[sylvanwitch]

Your Stevenson story reminded me of a girl who shared my first name in middle school but hated me so much that her parents agreed that she could legally change the spelling so that it would no longer be the same as mine.

In my defense, I had never done anything to earn the girl's enmity except have the poor manners to transfer into her small, Catholic middle school in the seventh grade, which, to be fair to me, was my parents' idea altogether. I was almost immediately unpopular, and I think she didn't want her name associated with mine, even though it was still pronounced the same (and also there were at least three other girls in the class with the same name, so...).

Anyhoo, I guess I can relate to Stevenson's story. As a high school teacher at an all-boys school, I think one of the (many) benefits of being childfree is that I don't have to try to find a boys' name that won't have negative associations for me, assuming I had a boy. Lol! I have colleagues who have lamented this very situation in their own, more prolific lives. ;-)

[regshoe]

Oh wow! While I am sorry to hear you were so unfairly hated, it's pretty funny that you have an example of exactly the same thing RLS did happening to you. I wonder what his problem with this mysterious other Lewis was...

[sovay]

yes, Robert Louis Stevenson did pronounce his middle name like Lewis with an S, not like Louis without an S.

I'd never heard his name pronounced any way other than with an S! That's interesting.

'due, it is said, to a strong distaste, shared by his father, for a fellow-citizen, who bore the name in the form in which Lewis had received it.'

(That's hilarious.)

[regshoe]

Apparently the S-or-not is a general US/UK English difference, of which I was unaware! Fanny, of course, was American, so I suppose she wouldn't have been surprised by the pronunciation.

[ethelmay]

Given the S at the beginning of Stevenson, I don't think I'd necessarily notice if someone said it the other way, unless they put in a dramatic pause or two. And I'm actually not sure whether USians typically say "Louis" with an S at the end or not, because (a) the name is out of fashion, (b) all the older men I know with that name are called Lou, and (c) if they weren't called Lou they'd be called Louie, if you see what I mean! (E.g., my father-in-law's boyhood friend Louie.) I do recall being surprised to find out that my internet acquaintance Dr. Margot Louis pronounced her last name Lewis.

[sovay]

Given the S at the beginning of Stevenson, I don't think I'd necessarily notice if someone said it the other way, unless they put in a dramatic pause or two.

I think it would be audible; the vowels are slightly different between the two versions of the name. That said, I am also not convinced the transatlantic distinction is total, because I've heard "Louis" pronounced like "Lewis" and like "Louie" (and also like French, but I assume that's not what we're talking about here). It's always felt to me like one of those things that idiosyncratically slides around, like whether "Leah" rhymes with "Lia" or "Leia."

[regshoe]

Huh, and I don't think I've ever heard Leah pronounced other than like Lia! So many interesting name pronunciations to learn. :D

[sovay]

and I don't think I've ever heard Leah pronounced other than like Lia!

It's the usual pronunciation in Hebrew and Yiddish.

[regshoe]

Surely treating Louie as a distinct nickname/spelling it differently suggests they do pronounce the S in Louis?

IME from listening to people talking about RLS and going 'hold on, how are they pronouncing his name there??', the pronunciations are distinguishable although pretty similar.

[ethelmay]

But I only know how it was spelled from my FIL's photo album. If I had only heard him spoken of I wouldn't know if he was being called Louie or Louis. Anyway, if I as a USian don't know which pronunciation to default to (even for RLS I had to stop and think which one I say), it's either not universal or never was. I can certainly envision a French-Canadian kid in the US being called Louis at home and thinking of it as Louis, and an Anglicized pronunciation (but no final S) at school and everyone there thinking of it as Louie. Similar to my half-Greek friend Melanie, whose mother called her Meli, meaning honey, but who was also sometimes called Melly as a nickname.

[regshoe]

Ah, yes, that makes sense!

[luzula]

I had no idea 'Louis' was usually pronounced without the 's' in British English! I also didn't know he was originally named Balfour as well.

Awww, what a lovely Armadale gift you got--it felt so tailored to your tastes. : )

[regshoe]

Balfour was his mother's maiden name (suggesting that Davie is intended to be a distant historical relative of his, which is very funny).

Yes, my Armadale gift is lovely and very well-tailored :D I have no idea who wrote it, so I'm looking forward to finding out!

[adore]

Balfour is a beautiful name. Worthy of the hero of a historical romance. //makes note

[regshoe]

Aww, it is a nice name!

[ethelmay]

My main association with it is with the prime minister of that name, of whom I am not a great fan.