Famous Names Which Are Also Sentences

733 words

This list originally appeared on Everything 2, but I took a dislike to Everything 2 when they started de-democratising the way nodes get promoted and deleted. So, although it’s still there, I took a copy to put here just in case.

02003-09-19: There is a (was: link broken) pretender to the crown. I will peruse his list for my own gain at a later date.

02003-06-05: Notice the great sentence-name heritage of the BBC Radio 1 Sunday chart countdown presenters: Simon Bates, Bruno Brookes, Wes Butters. Alas we are let down by Tommy Vance, Alan Freeman, Mark Goodier and Richard Skinner.

02003-05-12: Sorted the list alphabetically by surname. Please focus your efforts on contributing sentence names where the surname begins with A,E,O,Q,U,V,X,Y or Z. I appreciate X is a little ambitious.

  1. Lester Bangs (a music journalist), or Marc Bangs whos appearance on
    “How Clean is Your Home” gives him temporary notoriety
  2. Iain or Jeff Banks
  3. Norman or Simon Bates
  4. Brett Blewitt (Neighbours actor)
  5. Peter Bowles, or Camilla Parker-Bowles
  6. Jeff, Beau, Lloyd or Nash Bridges
  7. Saul Bellows
  8. Barry Bonds (”batter” for “The San Francisco Giants”, an American sports team)
  9. Mel Brooks or Bruno Brookes
  10. Gordon, Pete, Monty or George Burns
  11. William Burroughs
  12. Wes Butters
  13. Sarah Buys (Prince Charles’ daughter in law)
  14. Kimberly Caldwell (”American Idol” contestant)
  15. Santa Claus
  16. Courtney Cox
  17. Penelope Cruz, or Tom Cruise (they both work on ships)
  18. Nancy Drew
  19. Michael and Kirk Douglas
  20. Vanessa Feltz
  21. Lynne Fauldes-Wood
  22. Joseph or Ralph Fiennes
  23. Johnny Fingers (of the Boomtown Rats)
  24. Ella or Zelda Fitzgerald
  25. Mike Flowers of the Mike Flowers Pops, or Dick Flowers
    (”some guy from HP”)
  26. Ben Folds, of the Ben Folds Five
  27. John Fowles
  28. Samantha Fox
  29. Argelico Fucks (Spanish footballer, I kid you not)
  30. Gareth or Bill Gates
  31. Ryan Giggs
  32. Julian or Rupert Graves
  33. Jimmy Greaves
  34. Joanne or Christopher Guest
  35. Tony Hadley
  36. Nigel Havers
  37. Tony Hawkes
  38. Peter Heard (Chairman, Colchester FC) or John Heard (Governor Tancredi in Prison Break)
  39. Bill Hicks
  40. Thora Hird or Douglas Hurd
  41. Nerys Hughes
  42. Sammo Hung
  43. John Hurt
  44. Katie, Sherlock or John Holmes
  45. Jeremy Irons
  46. Muzzy Izzet
  47. Brian or Tracey Jacks
  48. Nick Kamen
  49. Patsy Kensit
  50. Chaka Khan
  51. Barbara Knox (Rita in Coronation Street), Mickey or
    Mallory Knox (natural born killers in Natural Born Killers)
  52. Lisa Kudrow
  53. Jane Leeves (from Frasier)
  54. Tracy Lords
  55. Howard Marks and therefore Groucho, Harpo, Chico, Zeppo or
    Karl Marx
  56. Brian May
  57. Sam Mendez (yes, tenuous)
  58. Hayley, Heather, Scott or Sir John Mills
  59. Prince Rogers Nelson (a very honourable exception to the
    “no more Rogers” request)
  60. Stevie Nicks
  61. Ivor Novello
  62. Rosa (civil rights icon) or Alex (Cornish lesbian) Parks
  63. Samuel Pepys (he of the diary)
  64. Judge James Pickles
  65. Barry Pinches (snooker player)
  66. Richard Pipes (adviser to President Reagan 1980-1983)
  67. Shabba Ranks
  68. Leann Rimes and indeed Busta Rhymes
  69. Eliyahu Rips (gullible “discoverer” of the “Bible Code”)
  70. Ben Schott (of Schott’s Original Miscellany)
  71. Matthew Rose (from Eastenders)
  72. Rosie Ribbons (UK “Pop Idol” contestant, and recording
    artise — and yes, there is a verb “To Ribbon”)
  73. Ted Rogers, or if you prefer, Katie Rogers from
    Brookside… or Lisa Rogers. No more Rogers’ please! Not
    even Mimi.
  74. Bobby Sands (Hunger striking sectarian)
  75. Prunella Scales
  76. William Shatner
  77. Billy Shears (of Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band)
  78. Brooke Shields
  79. Mahir Shukurov (Azerbaijan midfielder)
  80. Roni Size
  81. Wesley Snipes
  82. Britney Spears
  83. Mark Spitz (swimmer and gold medal magnet)
  84. Julia Stiles
  85. Doris Stokes (renowned medium)
  86. William Stones (Sheffield brewer)
  87. Levi or Una Stubbs
  88. Barry Took
  89. Tiffany Towers (star of Booberella among other films)
  90. Tom Waits
  91. Jennifer Warnes
  92. Roger Waters
  93. H.G. Wells or Orson Welles
  94. Wim Wenders
  95. George Wendt (Norm from Cheers)
  96. Simon Wicks (from Eastenders)
  97. Anne Widdecombe
  98. David Wilby (magazine editor)
  99. Toyah Wilcox
  100. Barbara Windsor
  101. Bill Withers
  102. Elijah or Victoria Wood
  103. Tiger or James Woods

Rules

  • Non-famous names are included at my discretion. I don’t intend to add any more, but Mark Bangs and Dick Flowers can stay.
  • Commands and requests directed at the famous name (”Fatboy, slim”, “Tanita, tick a Ram”) are not permissible. There are a few reasons for this:
    • The sentence works just as well with the first name removed.
    • It’s too easy: there are hundreds of such names, and the list would get too big.
    • It just feels wrong. Observing that “Brown” is a verb, so you could tell James to start doing so is just not as satisfying to me as noting that Roger waters.
  • It’s very rare that a sentence that’s not a direct statement will be acceptable (but I reserve the right).
  • Pidgin English with missing connecting words is not acceptable. Even overlooking the missing “p”, Noam Chomsky isn’t a sentence. To earn inclusion, he could change his surname to “Chomsaky”, “Chomsthaky”, “Chomskys”, etc.
  • Surrealism is permitted. I can’t picture what Orson looks like when he Welles, since liquid can well, so can he.
  • Reliance on a regional accent or other dodgy pronounciation is only acceptable in exceptionalc circumstances. I keep being tempted by Brian Cant, but I can’t bring myself to do it. If I was Scottish, I’d use Walt Disney, but I’m not. Sam Mendes, I’ve left in.

17 Responses to “Famous Names Which Are Also Sentences”

  1. Sean Says:
    June 27th, 2005 at 12:28

    Always a joy to revisit this list. You’re being hard on Walt Disney though. There’s a broken link at the top.

  2. Peter Sayer Says:
    November 25th, 2005 at 14:22

    Hope all’s well with you. For some reason we were discussing names which are also sentences in the office the other day, and I thought of your site — only to find it had moved. Now I’m here, I feel moved to “rescue” my July 1, 2003 posting of ten famous Belgians whose names are also sentences from the Wayback machine, and repost it here. I’ve taken the liberty of fixing the punctuation and clarifying a couple of the explanations:

    These people have the dubious double distinction of having names that are sentences AND being valid entries in a game of Ten Famous Belgians.

    (For those of you that haven’t played this, the idea is to come up with the names of 10 famous Belgians. It’s harder than it looks, and great for starting drunken arguments in pubs.)

    - Adolphe Sax (Guess which musical instrument he invented?)
    - Koen Wauters, lead singer of the popular (in Belgium) band “Clouseau”
    - Jean Aerts (cyclist, presumably injured when he dropped an H)
    - Ulla Werbrouck (women’s judo gold medallist. I don’t think this counts as pidgin, Ulla were broke is how they talk in Burnley…)
    - Hugo Claus, a poet and screenwriter
    - Julio Cortázar, writer (and perhaps bounty hunter during the Russian revolution)
    - Marc Eyskens (briefly prime minister in 1981, presumably ousted after accusations of sexual harrassment by Ken)
    - Wilfried Martens (prime minister 1979-81 and 1981-92, Wil remained in office because the electorate liked their carnivorous rodents fried)
    - Quentin Matsys (Flemish painter who refused to put gloss varnish on his works)
    - Briek Schotte (another cyclist, although with a name like that he could have been a marksman)

    –
    P.

  3. Heidi~ Says:
    December 17th, 2005 at 00:49

    LIkein it alot man . Peace x~

  4. john Says:
    May 19th, 2006 at 16:50

    Whatever happened to “Little Red Riding Hood”

  5. john Says:
    May 20th, 2006 at 01:04

    Not to mention Bizzy Lizzy or even Mrs Scrubbit. famous in the 50s

    http://www.whirligig-tv.co.uk/tv/children/watchwm/watchwm.htm

  6. John Says:
    May 22nd, 2006 at 13:47

    John, none of these work as far as I can tell. Check the Rules.

  7. john C Says:
    May 22nd, 2006 at 16:18

    Little Red Riding Hood.

    Little Red could be riding a horse called hood?

    Subject predicate nouns and verb.

    Bizzy Lizzy?
    Rules talk about not accepting commands and requests, what about questions.
    (Are you) busy Lizzy?

    Mrs, Scrubbit

    OK you got me on that one, probably could be a command so not permissible.

    Mrs go and scrub it.

    Good fun though, but I’m still trying to work out the that parallel universe
    you call videorama. 3 dimensional dataset (X,Y, time) and swapping the X and time axes, you been watching Dr who?
    JC

  8. John Says:
    May 23rd, 2006 at 12:01

    OK, Little Red Riding Hood comes under the same category as Noam Chomsky (bet you never thought you’d read THAT sentence!). If she was called “Little Reds Riding Hood”, that would work.

    For Busy Lizzy, “Are you” is too important to omit. Without them it is not a complete sentence.

    I’ve got a new one: the name John Heard scrolled across the screen during the intro to Prison Break. See how it is a complete sentence with no requirement to add or imagine extra words to make it correct English.

  9. John Says:
    May 23rd, 2006 at 12:02

    Of course I’ve been watching Dr. Who, by the way :)

  10. john C Says:
    May 23rd, 2006 at 18:25

    I suppose this guy is out of the question then, only I’ve heard of him:-

    http://www.usip.org/specialists/bios/current/stares.html

  11. John Says:
    May 24th, 2006 at 10:34

    Paul Stares: perfect, and a valuable addition to the comments list, but like most of those Belgians, he won’t go in the main list because he’s not generally famous enough.

    Neither is Marc Bangs of course, but I get to make arbitrary calls :D

  12. alex cornish Says:
    July 27th, 2006 at 21:17

    It was odd to see my name on your list, especialy as i mis read it. Anyway i like your list, and my favourite name is a lady I work with called Eileen Inward!

  13. jim Says:
    September 16th, 2006 at 12:34

    i’ve been thinking about compiling this same list for ages, so well done for getting there first!
    there are LOADS more that i will reveal at a later date.
    thanks, and keep me posted with more!!

  14. helpful pixie Says:
    March 28th, 2007 at 17:06

    Nigel Havers. (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=haver)

  15. Araç takip sistemi Says:
    December 17th, 2007 at 00:29

    Whatever happened to “Little Red Riding Hood�

  16. John Says:
    December 17th, 2007 at 16:41

    She was eaten by a wolf. But how is her name a sentence?

  17. Al Says:
    January 6th, 2008 at 17:11

    What does Wes Butter? Toast? Bread?

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