LADY MADONNA?

The rock musician, Mr Bono, is to receive a knighthood for his services to crooning and to trying to persuade governments to give financial support to poor nations (though he himself is noted for moving his arrangements to countries where there are tax advantages). As he is an Irishman by birth, the honour will be notional rather than usable, like that of (Sir) Bob Geldof. But were he in a position to flourish the title, what would he be called? Sir Bono? It is ridiculous. Would he revert to his given name and become Sir Paul Hewson?

Taking a daft name for showbiz purposes does rather leave one open to difficulty if one survives long enough to become respectable. Being British citizens, both Sting and Lulu might find themselves in a dilemma if suitably honoured. Sir Sting? Dame Lulu? Sir Gordon Sumner or Dame Marie Lawrie would do better but some of their fans would wonder who they were. Both Sir Cliff Richard and Sir Elton John have retained their showbiz names with their knighthoods, rather than becoming Sir Harry Webb and Sir Reg Dwight respectively, much as Sir Rex (actually Reg) Harrison and Dame Ninette de Valois (formerly a Wicklow girl called Edris Stannus) did before them. But all these showbiz names were honour-ready when chosen. Prince clearly never had this dilemma to consider.

Bono's theoretical problem would be greatly compounded if his guitarist were to be able to follow him into the ranks of knights – mercifully he too would be debarred from styling himself 'Sir' by virtue of Irish birth. For the humbly christened David Evans is known to rock posterity as The Edge. I always thought this was the most unbearably pretentious and self-important name in all of rock until I heard the U2 band's vocalist speak of him in an interview. With his Irish accent and pronunciation, Bono calls him "The Hedge". It's a great pity that there is no chance Mr Evans will ever be raised to a seat in the House of Lords, where he could take the title Baron The Hedge of Reason.

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