After many years of being pragmatic about my name I think that the time might be finally right to change it by deed poll. I have never liked it, but now I positively dislike it. Rumour has it I was named after Brian Snape, our family’s wealthiest relative and the visionary who shaped the future of rugby league as Chairman of Salford RLFC at The Willows. Perhaps it was in the hope that some of his good fortune would rub off on me. It hasn’t…
When I was younger, people used to say somewhat disparagingly, ‘I have an uncle called Brian.’ Now I have become that uncle who is a bit of an embarrassment, particularly at Christmas, but who you feel might leave you something in his will if you are nice to him. N.B. I have nothing to leave. Names go out of fashion and come back in again, but I don’t feel Brian was ever in vogue and I certainly can’t see it coming in from nowhere to top this year’s top 10 of favourite boys’ names.
And it is the ridicule you suffer as a result of your appellation which makes you seek out self-help groups for people called Brian. Or ‘Brain’ as we are often known. If I had a £1 for every time I had been addressed as ‘Brain Beech’ I would be a very wealthy man, which I am not. If, however, I had patented the name Brian being used in adverts, TV programmes, films for the dimmest, daftest, most downtrodden of individuals then I would be a multi-millionaire.
Brian from ‘The Magic Roundabout’, hardly the coolest of characters to be associated with when you are just setting out on your life as a ladies’ man in the 70s (albeit a spotty and inept one.) ‘The Life of Brian’ from the Monty Python team, which made it very hard to look on the bright side. ‘Why are you so clever, Brian?’ from the Cadbury’s Chocolate Fingers adverts, with the irony being laid on thicker than the chocolate. And now, ‘You’re so supermarket.com Brian.’
Chris Evans said on the radio the other week that the first computer virus was called Brian. I rest my case! There hasn’t been a Hurricane Brian. Or a Saint Brian. Or an international sex god called Brian (present company excepted.) Or anyone really, really famous. And I am discounting Brian May, Brian Clough and Brian Cox for a variety of reasons and Bryan Robson, Bryan Ferry and Bryan Adams because they can’t even spell ‘Brian’!
So, my new name – what should it be? Answers on a postcard please to Brain Beech at Havas PR UK in Manchester…