No laughs for Swedes' name game

[Reuters, Boston Globe 30-May-96]

STOCKHOLM -- A court has rejected the appeal of parents who have been fighting for the right to give their 5-year-old son a 43-letter first name that is nonsense to everyone but them.

The parents in the southern town of Halmstad pronounce their son's name Albin, but want to spell it "Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssqlbb11116."

A lcal court fined them $750 last month for not registering a first name for their child by his fifth birthday.

Responding to the fine, the parents, who were not identified, submitted the 43-letter name, saying it was a "pregnant, expressionistic development that we see as an artistic creation." The court rejected the name.

The parents took their case to an appeal court in Gothenburg, western Sweden, saying their son's name should be seen in a pataphysical spirit. Pataphysics was the invention of French absurdist writer and satirist Alfred Jarry, best known for his trilogy of Ubu plays.

The Gothenburg court rejected the appeal and ruled that the parents must pay the fine, according to the Swedish news agency TT.