In case you haven’t noticed, style guides disagree with each other and get updated.
They are not something universally set in stone from ancient times. And style guides follow usage. If most people use a particular style, the guides get updated! Think about that. We get to tell them what’s right.
In publishing my research papers I sometimes came across “rules” that the journal’s style guide enforced that were stupid and counterproductive.
Style guides are made by humans. They screw up. They are not holy writ.
It’s simple logic: either position in a sentence alters capitalization or it doesn’t. Pick one. (And I guarantee you it won’t be “All lowercase except the first letter.”)
Unfortunately, too many style “experts” are more concerned with “appearance” than logic. Hence you get horrible decisions such as punctuation should always come before a close quote even if that symbol makes no sense within the quote. Why? They say it looks better that way. But that harms functionality bozos.
Subrant: I just finished a book where the first 4 words or so of each chapter are in all small caps. Incredibly ugly and jarring. “Style” my foot.
Well, yes, they’ll agree for a lot of stuff, but there’s a good amount of disagreements between them in relatively common questions as to English language. For example, Oxford/serial comma, yea or nay? Apostrophe-s after names ending in “s,” yes or no? For that matter, where does punctuation go when dealing with quotes, like in my last sentence? UK and US will have different answers. And so on. There’s even a blog dedicated to all the differences in AP vs Chicago Style. There’s plenty of everyday situations where the way you render it in writing will make a difference according to which style guide you adhere to, the issues of serial commas and punctuation within quotation marks being the most common (I’d think.)
I figure a written name is a label that approximates the pronunciation of your spoken name, and you get to choose which letters best represent that. Unless you’re insane, most people and style guides will respect that. However capitalization is not related to pronunciation, and is heavily influenced based on the usage of the overwhelming majority. Therefore you have no natural right to proscribe the “wrong” capitalization of your name.
If your name is George, then it’s GEORGE or GeOrGE, or any variation thereof. If you choose an alternate spelling such as Jorge (not hor-he), then fine, it’s up to you to correct people who mispronounce it (fuck you, Miguel, who pronounced your name “Michael” and reamed me out for writing “Micheal” in my article). Write it as Zhorge, or Djorge, if you like, but you don’t dictate capitalization.
My go-to example of a lowercase initial name is Jerry terHorst . Ford’s Press Secretary (until Ford pardoned Nixon).
He was the son of Dutch immigrants and that’s the way the Dutch name was written.
It wasn’t invented, wasn’t an affectation, etc.
To him and his parents it would appear odd and offensive to see it written “Terhorst” or some such in any context.
If you have a problem with a non-capital at the beginning of sentence that’s your problem. Get over it and move on. In particular, stop being so provincial. It’s a big world out there.
And, yes, at the beginning of the sentence, if you scan through newspaper articles, it was capitalized. Like here (last paragraph). And that’s not unusual. Plenty of surnames with “van” and “de” or “d’” that begin with small letters, too. They, conventionally, get capitalized at the beginning of a sentence.
Here’s one where they keep “terHorst” in the headline, but “TerHorst” in the copy.
It’s a wide world out there, with lots of localized, individual publication styles. Hence, follow the style guide and the expectations of your audience.