The return of the mononym

[Laurence Horn]

According to an Op-Ed in today's NYT, Hillary is running on "The
Mononym Platform", although this seems to refer only to the fact that
she bills (no pun intended) herself as "Hillary" and not as "Hillary
Clinton" (or "Clinton" for that matter), thereby aligning her
nomenclaturally, if not politically, with Madonna, Cher, Wynona,
Elvis, Che, Pele, et al.  "Mononym" is unlisted in AHD4 and its entry
in the OED sports a death dagger as "obsolete" as well as
"scientific", with no cites past 1899 and no proper name examples,
but there are 1670 google hits, including the above
individuals--chiefly singers, actresses, revolutionaries, and soccer
stars--although no Hillary yet.  There are but 10 hits on Nexis
(Major Papers), including today's Op-Ed, dating back to 1981 (a
reference in the Washington Post to a 14-year-old actress billed as
"Louanne" who sang the role of Annie at the Kennedy Center).  Is
"mononym" a candidate for best revival, if it really did lapse for
most of a century before coming back to life?

LH

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