[Opinions] Re: Iris
in reply to a message by Fiammetta
Is the pronunciation really an issue? Isis was a perfectly respectable goddess for millennia before she became an acronym, and anyway her name and the acronym are both pronounced Ay-sis in English - at least, I've never heard anything else.
Iris is an excellent name. Usually I'm a bit hesitant about names that start with pronouns, like IIIvor and MEEEgan, but somehow Iris is just different. Such a wonderful flower, for a start, and not widely used for people even when flower names like Lily and Rose are in full bloom everywhere. It's one of the very few flower names I'd even consider: Iris, for its elegance and dignity, and Rosemary or Rosamond, just because, and Daisy for its cheerful perkiness.
My daughter's school has the fleur-de-lys on its badge, and the top academic achievers receive what are known as Iris Awards at year-end; just a piece of paper with their name on it, but highly esteemed.
And, I've no idea if a copy still exists out in the bookselling world, but if you ever find "The Diary of Iris Vaughan", grab it with both hands and never let go! It was written by a little girl (Iris Vaughan!) in South Africa about a hundred or so years ago: she was the kind of highly intelligent child who gets under people's feet a lot, so her family gave her a notebook, told her what a diary was, and she caught on. Everything went in, spelling mistakes and all, and it's totally hilarious as well as providing a view of a long-ago world. Lots of people thought it was a fake when it was finally published in the early 1960s I think, but then lots of other people refuted that, saying that they'd been in the same places as the Vaughans and remembered Iris well, and could confirm that she'd spent a lot of time writing.
Iris is an excellent name. Usually I'm a bit hesitant about names that start with pronouns, like IIIvor and MEEEgan, but somehow Iris is just different. Such a wonderful flower, for a start, and not widely used for people even when flower names like Lily and Rose are in full bloom everywhere. It's one of the very few flower names I'd even consider: Iris, for its elegance and dignity, and Rosemary or Rosamond, just because, and Daisy for its cheerful perkiness.
My daughter's school has the fleur-de-lys on its badge, and the top academic achievers receive what are known as Iris Awards at year-end; just a piece of paper with their name on it, but highly esteemed.
And, I've no idea if a copy still exists out in the bookselling world, but if you ever find "The Diary of Iris Vaughan", grab it with both hands and never let go! It was written by a little girl (Iris Vaughan!) in South Africa about a hundred or so years ago: she was the kind of highly intelligent child who gets under people's feet a lot, so her family gave her a notebook, told her what a diary was, and she caught on. Everything went in, spelling mistakes and all, and it's totally hilarious as well as providing a view of a long-ago world. Lots of people thought it was a fake when it was finally published in the early 1960s I think, but then lots of other people refuted that, saying that they'd been in the same places as the Vaughans and remembered Iris well, and could confirm that she'd spent a lot of time writing.