Liverpudlian nonsense prose

[jane l]

if it takes a week to walk a fortnight how long does it take for a long legged spider in hobnailed boots and spats on to push a barrow load of darkness up a light passage

[goldie61]

Been following this thread with interest,
Love the last one Jane! Gave me a good laugh to start the day!!

[heywood]

That is brilliant Jane!

I can remember as a child how I would ask my uncle to talk back slang. He was still so good. My mum could do a little and she used to tell me how they would both talk in it to annoy their mother. Eventually someone would get a slap or something thrown at them.

[Viktoria]

Isay isthay ethay amesay ackbangslay athay ouyay ememberay?
We knocked off the initial  letter  if it was a consonant and put it to the end of the word then added ay. So Viktoria would become  iktoriavay. You get quite good at it and can do it rapidly .Came in very handy at times--" oday ouyay antway emay otay acksmay ouryay egslay? ellway opstay isbehavingmay!" When the children  were getting silly in public, egging one another on..People may have thought we were foreign visitors. My husband can`t grasp it at all. Iktoriavay.

[heywood]

Oh that's it Viktoria. 
I was enthralled with my uncle's ability to do it just like that! Obviously my grandmother (who died before I was born but I got lots of stories about her from mum) was not quite so enamoured of her children's linguistic talents!

for my cheek I used to get the slap on the legs - not often but enough to remember the smarting! 

[IrishOrigins]

Am thoroughly enjoying this thread!!

The backslang you talk about we used to call "pig latin" and used it a lot as kids.  I can still do it a bit, but have to think about it!!

I remember some of those rhymes too, and they came from my 5th generation Australian mother who was of mainly Irish descent.  Goodness knows where she got them from.

There was one she couldn't remember except for the last line and I wonder if anyone could fill me in on it (after puzzling about it for most of my life)?

It ended up with "and when he hop he fly".  Mum could never go back any further than that, but the silly line ended up as a pretty common family saying - meaning absolutely anything, but usually nothing at all   .

Philippa

[LizzieW]

Never heard of the back slang, but remember all the skipping rhymes and I lived in Cheshire as a child.

Viktoria - Please translate your back slang, even with your instructions I can't work out what you've typed.

Lizzie

[IrishOrigins]

It's been a long time since I even attempted this, but see how I go with a translation.

"Do you want me to smack your legs?  Well stop misbehaving!"

Close Victoria?

Philippa

[LizzieW]

Thanks Phillipa, Now I get it.  So the translation of the first sentence of Viktoria's

Isay isthay ethay amesay ackbangslay athay ouyay ememberay

would be:

Is this the same backslang that you remember?

Seems like hard work, but I expect for children it would have been very easy.