Two Chaps Talking

Mon Vieux,

I am vexed and irked beyond measure.

Whilst getting outside of a Lucky Jim the other day an omi said to me, 'Look at that whistle. What an eek. All joshed up you're fortuna you are.'

Had a droog overdone the old moloko lite? Was he about to visit something horrorshow about my fragrant person? Should I have tolchocked it sharpish hoping to viddy the rozzers? Would I be wiping krovvy off my gobber with my rooks?

No my dear Chap. Have a snifter. All is well. I write merely to enjoy some of the more outlandish variations of our wonderful language. You'll have noticed some Polari, used by chaps whose love dared not speak its name during the fifties and sixties when their collars might end up getting felt, rather than their other bits, should they have been caught seeking company. Mr Burgess of course needs no explaining, any more than does the odd Cockney rhyme. But there was a shibboleth in there and I have no doubt you spotted it. It's dirty filthy ugly head reared up in relation to a simple drink.

Yes that's right, the so-called word 'lite'. Wholly unacceptable in polite society it would have had the saintly Sir K spluttering in disgust. He would have castigated the perpetrator to within an inch of his sanity, albeit not that very far considering.

Lest I give the wrong impression let me state for the record that I consider the English language a living breathing organism and each and every regional variation as valid as the next. Yes that's right. From Newcastle to New York to New South Wales there is a constant stream of excellent contributions to the lexicon and I salute them all. I may not use them but I heartily endorse their existence and welcome them into our Oxford English Dictionary with open arms.

So what's my bloody problem?

In a word cokesnortingadvertisingdrones. I can just see them sitting round their horrible little workstations congratulating each other on their revolting goatee/Hoxton art gallery/new SUV/Hamptons restaurant/darling little Moroccan souk spice stall/&cet. Over their 'Bud Lites' they agree that the world needs more tat and it should be called a 'Towlmastr' and it needs to be trademarked. And where would we be without a 'Plumr'? And what of 'Acuvu' and 'Accu Chek' - can the world really last without them?

Harmless fun for the great unwashed a chap might think. Let the hoi polloi consume their baubles and potions and enjoy them, for what harm do they do?

Would that it were so. That these 'words' are registered as trademarks is laughable, as though anyone would else would want to use them. Ha ha indeed.

But there is a dark side. They creep, you see, these 'words,' into the language.

It is now quite normal for teenagers in this country to spell the word night thus n-i-t-e. Ditto l-i-t-e for light. The list goes on and it gets worse. Not only that but the jack-booted Murdoch propaganda machine that is called Fox is presuming to declare ownership of the words 'fair and balanced' in order to prevent a book being published that features the same words in its title. That the book exposes Fox's propensity for lying filth is of course the driving motive, but it is an alarming precedent. Are we to be prevented from using our own language according to the whim of corporations, left only with the new 'words' provided and approved by their advertising agencies?

It is well known that the White House Inc. and Bush Gov. Corp. are striving to make what is already a corporate society more so. How long before they mandate new spellings according to brand sponsorship, or outlaw old ones that have been registered as trademarks or are perhaps not to their political liking? With their economy of attention span and intelligence they might want a name for this new way of speaking. Something catchy and easy to pronounce. Newspeak perhaps.

Lest you think all is doom and gloom this fortnight let me go on to fill you in on an amusing new form of entertainment here in the New World. Now it is well known and accepted that the second best-dressed tranche of society after the Two Chaps is the Friends of Dorothy. Slim, mannered, clean and well-turned out they are a credit to their kind and exactly where a chap should turn should he find himself without access to our own advice.

Of late some thoughtful souls have realised this and turned the process into an amusing television program. Briefly a five-some of light-in-the-loafer chaps take on an itinerant outdoor labourer and try to teach him how to tie his own shoe laces and use a knife and fork. It is hilarious. Particularly as once they're finished they turn the oaf loose on his unsuspecting female mate.

Having hitherto spoken only in monosyllables and been fed outdoors the victims adjust with varying degrees of success. After extensive training some are able to eat at tables though one thought pushing a finger-full of dark brown chocolate mousse into his mates' mouth was somehow conducive to amour ('That's considered a bad thing in our society' quipped one F of D). All good clean fun and useful in explaining to the ill-informed that well-dressed men don't all shop on the same side of the street (my tailor's down a back alley in fact). I am informed that this is about to be foisted upon the Motherland. Thus far it carries my tacit endorsement.

On that I leave you, once more to take up the sword in defence of all that is correct.

Vulneratus non victus,

S