1A The ‘name game’ winners

‘What’s in a name?’, asked Shakespeare’s Juliet. ‘A rose by any other name would smell as sweet,’ she concluded; in other words that the name of a person is irrelevant. However, research by psychologists suggests that our name can have a direct effect on our personal happiness.

Having a popular name, it seems, can make other people think you are intelligent and attractive even before they have met you. This is because, according to psychologist Dr Philip Erwin, people associate a particular name with a stereotyped image. However, having an unpopular name can have the opposite effect. ‘It can even affect your employment prospects,’ says Dr Erwin. ‘Employers usually make up their mind within two minutes of a job interview. Part of that process is reading an applicant’s name on the CV, which may immediately create a negative stereotype in the employer’s mind.’

As a result, according to Dr Erwin, people with less attractive names tend to work harder to get on in life. As part of his research, he rated the first names of 68 psychology students for attractiveness, and then compared their exam marks. He found that students with unpopular, old-fashioned names did significantly better (an average of more than 3% higher marks). This suggested that they were aware that they had an unattractive name, and were working harder to overcome negative attitudes towards their name.

Names considered to be ‘less attractive’ were, for example, Norman, Ronald, and Albert for men, and Gillian, Pauline, and Agnes for women. ‘More attractive’ names were Stephen, David, Emma, and Charlotte. Actors and pop stars certainly seem to take this into account and it is quite common for them to change the name they were born with to a more ‘glamorous’ one, for example, Whoopi Goldberg (born Caryn Johnson), and Bono (born Paul Hewson).

For many years now there has been a definite tendency among British parents to choose unusual or famous names. In the 1990s, Phoebe became popular for a while, almost certainly as a result of the hit US TV series Friends, and Jack, which had previously been considered an unattractive, old-fashioned name, became dramatically more popular because of Leonardo DiCaprio’s Titanic hero, Jack Dawson. Recently Keira has become a popular girl’s name (after the actress Keira Knightley), and William and Harry (after the princes) are invariably in the top ten names chosen for boys.

But the question is, will these names still be considered attractive when their owners grow up? ‘When I was at school there was no one in my class with the same name as me,’ says 34-year-old Farrah Stephens, who was named after the TV actress Farrah Fawcett, one of the stars of the 1970s’ TV series Charlie’s Angels. ‘By the time I was 15 everybody had forgotten about her, and I was left with this really stupid name. In the end I decided to use my middle name, Diane.’ Clearly, the choice of a name for a child is a difficult decision to take. Dr Erwin gives some practical advice: ‘Choose names for your children which they will be happy with in twenty years’ time, and choose a second name in case your child doesn’t like the first one.’

1B THEIR STORYHow did it all start?In November 1970 an unknown Swedish group called ‘Festfolket’ played their first concert in front of five embarrassed couples in a restaurant in Gothenburg in Sweden. Their ‘live’ performance was not a great success, and by the end of the week only three people turned up to hear them. Incredibly, just a few years later they would be the most successful pop group in the world. In 1977 when they played at London’s Royal Albert Hall, the box office received three and a half million requests for tickets! ‘Festfolket’ consisted of two engaged couples, Agnetha and Björn, who had fallen in love at first sight in 1968 (they married in 1971) and Benny and Anni-Frid (who married in 1978). When the group’s manager sent them messages he used to write to ABBA (using their initials) to save time and this became their new name. Their fortunes immediately improved. In 1974 Abba, singing in English, won the Eurovision Song Contest with Waterloo, which became an instant hit all over the world. For the next decade they dominated the pop music scene with hit records such as Fernando, Dancing queen, and The winner takes it all.

Why were Abba so successful?First there were the songs themselves, which in the early years were catchy tunes with simple pop lyrics. Also, because Abba were Swedish, their English pronunciation was very clear and easy to understand and this definitely helped their worldwide appeal. Another attraction was their outrageous clothes. ‘For Eurovision I wore a black jacket with pearls and satin trousers with silver boots,’ says Björn. ‘I looked like a fat Christmas tree!’ But on stage and on record the magic ingredient was probably the two girls’ voices and the contrast between them. Although Abba broke up in 1981 there was a big revival in their popularity in the 90s, mainly because of two films: Priscilla, Queen of the Desert and Muriel’s Wedding, both partly inspired by the group and their music. In 1999 the London musical, Mamma Mia, based on the group’s songs, sold out night after night, and twenty-five years after their first hit, Abba’s album Greatest Hits was back at number one in the Top 20.

Part 2Why did they break up?The problems started when Abba went on their first world tour in 1976 to coincide with their new album Dancing queen. Anni-Frid enjoyed touring but Agnetha didn’t. By this time she had a young baby. ‘Agnetha didn’t really want to go anywhere,’ says Björn, ‘so it made things difficult. For her the family came first, and Abba second. I thought we could have both.’In 1978 Björn and Agnetha separated. With the separation, the mood of Abba’s songs darkened and the lyrics became, it seemed, painfully autobiographical. ‘They came from the heart,’ says Björn. ‘I wrote about a divorce in Knowing me, knowing you and The winner takes it all. Not necessarily our divorce, but I always wrote what I felt. When I asked Agnetha to sing The winner takes it all, it was strange to hear her when we recorded it. Afterwards there were tears, because there were no winners in our divorce.’ In 1980 Benny left Anni-Frid, and relations in the studio between the members of the group became increasingly tense. In 1981 the group split up. In Björn’s words, ‘We’d all run out of energy.’Where are they now?After the break-up Benny and Björn carried on writing music together, including the musical Chess. The women both had reasonably successful solo careers. All the members of the group remarried. After the break-up of her second marriage, Agnetha lived alone on a Swedish island and almost became a recluse. In a recent

documentary for British TV, she was the only member of Abba who wouldn’t be interviewed. Although the four members of Abba have been offered huge amounts of money to make a comeback and play together again, they have always refused.

1C Danger!Sense of humour failureBill Bryson is a best-selling American travel writer who has lived in both the US and the UK. He has written several humorous books and many articles about British and American life.

1 Here’s my tip of the week. Don’t make jokes in America. Even in experienced hands, a joke can be a dangerous thing. I came to this conclusion recently while passing through Customs and Immigration at Logan airport in Boston. As I approached the last immigration official, he said to me, ‘Any fruit or vegetables?’What does this question mean? Why does he ask it?2 I considered for a moment. ‘Sure, why not?’ I said. ‘I’ll have four pounds of potatoes and some mangoes, if they’re fresh.’Instantly, I could see that I had misjudged my audience. He looked at me with one of those slow, dark expressions that you never want to see in a uniformed official, but especially in a US Customs and Immigration officer.Why did the customs official begin to get angry?3 Luckily he appeared to conclude that I was just incredibly stupid. ‘Sir,’ he enquired more specifically, ‘are you carrying any items of fruit or vegetable?’‘No, sir, I am not,’ I answered at once, and gave him the most respectful look I believe I have ever given anybody in my life. I left him shaking his head. I am sure that for the rest of his career he will always be telling people about the idiot who thought he was a greengrocer.Why do you think he gave the official a very respectful look?4 The same thing happened another time when I was talking to my neighbour about a disastrous airline trip which had left me stranded overnight in Denver. ‘Who did you fly with?’ he asked.What does this question really mean?5 ‘I don’t know,’ I replied. ‘They were all strangers.’ He looked at me with an expression of panic.‘No, I meant which airline did you fly with,’ he said. Soon after this my wife ordered me to stop making jokes with him, as our conversations were giving him a migraine.Why didn’t his neighbour understand his answer?6 ‘Irony’ of course is the key word here. Americans don’t use it very much. (I’m being ironic; they don’t use it at all.) The English writer Howard Jacobson says that Americans don’t have a sense of humour. Actually he is wrong. Many of the funniest people who ever lived were or are Americans, such as the Marx brothers or Woody Allen. But it is certainly true that wit and sense of humour are not valued as much in America as they are in Britain. The comedian John Cleese once said: ‘An Englishman would rather be told that he was a bad lover than that he had no sense of humour.’What’s the difference between British and American humour?

7 It isn’t that there are no people with an active sense of humour in America, it’s just that there are fewer of them. When you meet one it’s like I imagine it must be when two Masons recognize each other across a crowded room. The last time I experienced this was a few weeks ago when I arrived at our local airport and approached a cab for a ride home. ‘Are you free?’ I innocently asked the driver.What does the question mean in this context? What’s another meaning of ‘free’?8 He looked at me with an expression I recognized at once – the look of someone who can see the chance of a joke. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I charge like everyone else.’ I could almost have hugged himWhy did he feel like hugging the cab driver?

Adapted from Notes From A Big Country, Bill Bryson

Glossarytip a piece of useful adviceapproach go near sb / sthmisjudge form a wrong opinion of sb / sthenquire ask for informationrespectful politestranded not able to get homesuch asfor examplewould rather would prefercharge ask for money for sthhug put your arms around sb to show love / affection