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I'm not a fan of it as a first name, it does remind me of tennis too much.

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This post reminded me that there's an American tennis player called Tennys Sandgren. Supposedly his name is pronounced the same as tennis.

This will always remind me of Ben 10, which isn’t a bad association, but I don’t really care for this name. I’d much prefer Dennis (instead of Denis), and think that’s a cool name!

It's on my GP list. I'm not usually one for surnames as given names, but I make exceptions somewhat often, I suppose. I'm a fan of Alfred, Lord Tennyson's work, but I also just like the sound of it. I also thought the nickname Denny might be cute for it. Tenny isn't bad, either. And I know Denny is maybe a bet of a stretch, but I don't feel it's any weirder than Bob for Robert or Bill for William.

Seems pretentious imv because of the poet, who was introduced to me in school as "Alfred, Lord Tennyson."
To me it's a bit like Byron (Lord Byron) ... but it does not sound like any first-name, and also Byron is Romantic and Tennyson is Victorian. So it seems more prissy and less poet-y, to me. I guess not every American takes Brit Lit at an impressionable age though ...
Maybe it seems more like Harrison to others.
I don't think of tennis though ...! I might notice that if I were around a Tennyson, and heard it said aloud.
Anyway, English -son surnames as firstnames are nms in any case. My maiden name is a -son name - I think that is part of why it's so unappealing to me.

It's pretty good. To the younger folk it's associated with Benjamin Tennyson of the cartoon network show "Ben 10". not the wordt namesake one could have.

It's very handsome and easily my favorite -son name.

I don't think it's bad as lnfns go, although most of that category is pretentious by default, and Tennyson in particular can seem so because it's name dropping a famous writer. It's also a celebrity baby name (Russell Crowe used it for his kid), so maybe that gives it a faddish vibe. And it does remind me of tennie shoes if I dwell on it, but I'm indifferent about that.

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Anyway, I liked it for a short while as a teenager. Probably because I've always liked Tennessee / Tenny as a name (and I have never thought of tennis when hearing Tennessee)...plus recently I've been contemplating the merits of Denzel "Denny" because I like Denny and *el names but not really Denis, so that's vaguely in the same category. Stylewise it also reminds me of Penny, Edison, Emerson, Harrison which seem normal enough.

This message was edited 8/22/2023, 8:17 AM

Don't like it - I think its unattractive, personally

I like the surname but it doesn’t give the vibe of a first name, and I’m usually pretty lenient on last-name-first-names.

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What’s the nickname gonna be? Ten? Tenny? Doesn’t work for me.

Much like Emerson, Auden, Eliot (this spelling) etc., it feels pretentious. The sound overall is fine. Not really my style because I like nicknames.

It's taking the unattractive surname as first name nonsense to a whole new horrendous level. Just a random surname off a dead celeb and slap it on the kid. Why does anyone think that a good idea?

Don't really like it as a name, it's a suburb to me and surname