Johnson's Brexit Dictionary E-Book

Harry Eyres

• Herausgeber: Pushkin Press
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 77

Beschreibung

A delightful and essential compendium of words, new, old or abused through Brexit. BLUNDER. To mistake grossly, to err very widely. 'Someone had blundered' (Alfred, Lord Tennyson, 'Charge of the Brexit Brigade') EUTHANASIA. An easy death. Strangulation by EU regulations, according to Brexiteers. 'Brexit' seems to mean many things, but none of them is clear. Fortunately, help is at hand from Harry Eyres and George Myerson, who offer us pithy and incisive definitions of the key terms associated with this momentous process. From 'COCK-UP' to 'WRETCHED' via 'BUFFOON' and 'MAY', Johnson's Brexit Dictionary is a delightful, witty and essential compendium inspired by Dr Johnson's original, and updated for our turbulent times.

Leseprobe

Dedicated to the immortal memory ofSAMUEL JOHNSON

Poet, critic, essayist, biographer, lexicographer, editor

Born Lichfield 18th September 1709 Died London 13th December 1784

‘As any opinion grows popular it will innovate speech in the same proportion as it alters practice’

SAMUELJOHNSON, Preface toA Dictionary of the English Language

‘Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel’

Remark made by Samuel Johnson on the evening of 7th April 1775. Recorded by James Boswell, his friend and biographer.

Contents

Title PageDedicationEpigraphPreface  ABCDEFGHIKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ  A Note on Sources and Nomenclature Copyright

Preface

Brexit is a lexicographer’s nightmare. After all, the best definition the person responsible for carrying through this enormity has been able to devise is a circular one: ‘Brexit means Brexit.’ Brexit may in fact mean many things, but none of them is clear: a negotiating process in which no real negotiating ever gets done; a promise of trade deals which somehow fail to materialize; the taking back of control leading to ever-intensifying chaos; or a play by Samuel Beckett in which the main character never arrives.

Fortunately a saviour is at hand. We have been able to enlist the help of the great eighteenth-century lexicographer and polymath Dr Samuel Johnson – the man who heroically and single-handedly, in response to the efforts of the entire French Academy, created the first comprehensive, illustrated dictionary of the English language. Johnson’s Dictionary is one of the landmark accomplishments not only of English but of world literature, a work whose scholarship and lexicography, though of course dated, are still often enlightening and whose wit, wisdom and eloquence are no more past their read-by date than Hamlet or Pride and Prejudice.

Johnson’s Brexit Dictionary gives us the pithy, incisive and sometimes opinionated definitions of the key terms associated with this momentous process which Samuel Johnson would have added to his classic Dictionary of the English Language, had he been preparing a new edition in 2018. These new definitions sit alongside original ones, which illuminate our current quandaries and predicament in surprising ways.

Politically, we can only guess what Johnson would have made of Brexit. He was a devout Anglican and a staunch Tory; also a man of surprisingly liberal and forward-looking views on many subjects. He loved to insult the Scots and the French, but at the same time he admired many aspects of Scottish society and would never have undertaken the Dictionary if he had not wished to emulate the French Academy. Above all, he was no British bulldog but a European scholar, a student of many languages and disciplines, intimately versed in all the intellectual currents of the continent.

In his original preface, Johnson lamented the fate of the lexicographer, never appreciated for his or her invaluable work in mapping out the terrain of the language and making comprehensible what was once a ‘wild and barbarous jargon’, but only blamed for mistakes. We do not doubt that this will be our fate also.

A

ABSURD.

Unreasonable; without judgement, as used of people and in Brexit disputes, suggesting charms as much as folly, or the charm of folly.

‘you had better take for business a man somewhat absurd, than over formal’

(BACON)

‘the voters did prefer the Leave campaign, though somewhat absurd, to the Remain campaign, for it was over formal’

(BACKON)

‘Credo quia absurdum.’

(LATIN PRINCIPLE OF FAITH)

‘It’s a bit absurd, so I kind of believe it.’

(BREXIT PRINCIPLE OF FAITH)

ADJOURNMENT.

[adjournment, French] An assignment of a day, or a putting off till another day.

‘We will, and we will not, and then we will not again, and we will. At this rate we run our lives out in adjournments from time to time, out of a fantastical levity that holds us off and on, betwixt hawk and buzzard.’

(L’ESTRANGE)

‘The Brexit deal will be an adjournment – the easiest thing in human history.’

(PSEUDO-FOX)

‘The Brexit talks were adjourned once again.’

(SPOKESPERSON FOR M. BARNIER)

AFFIDAVIT.

Signifies in the language of the common law that he made oath; a declaration upon oath. Hence, currently, to Daffidavis, to swear a wild oath in the manner of Daffidavis, agent for Brexit abroad, as ‘He Daffidavised that he would not make any compromise.’

AGREEMENT.

Concord. A feature rarely found in the world of Brexit.

‘What agreement is there between the hyena and the dog?’

(ECCLESIASTES VIII.18)

‘What agreement is there between Mr Fox and the frogs?’

(YE DAILY CHAIN MAIL)

ALECONNER.

An official in the city of London, whose business is to inspect the measures of publick houses.

One who seeks to deceive by drinking ale or being seen drinking ale, as ‘Sir Boris hath not a half of Master Nigel’s skill as an aleconner.’ (Shakespeare, Henry IV Part VIII)

ALGORITHM.

Used to imply the six operations of arithmetic, or the science of numbers, and latterly, occult influences that both reveal and shape the future.

‘Once upon a day, it was ye Sonne wot won it for Sir Major, but now ’tis the algorithms that do win all.’

(LORD BERNERS-LEE)

‘Master Soothsayer, tell us what the algorithms do say, prithee do!’

(SHAKESPEARE, BORIUS CAESAR)

AMEND.

To correct; to change anything wrong to something better; a key word in the parliamentary turmoil over Brexit.

‘Amend your ways and your doings.’

(JEREMIAH VII.3)

‘Amend your Brexit bill and your doings.’

(AH JEREMY XXX.1)

Amendment, a change from the bad for the better.

‘some things in it have passed your approbation and amendment’

(DRYDEN)

‘A multitude of things in this Brexit bill be so bad that the less bad counts for an amendment still.’

(ADDIDSON)

ANATIFEROUS.

Producing ducks. So, BREXANATIFEROUS, producing dead ducks, which quack loudly ne’ertheless.

ANCHENTRY.

Antiquity of a family; ancient dignity; the part of the populace that widely voted for Brexit.

ANGER.

Uneasiness or discomposure of the mind, upon the receipt of any injury, with a present purpose of revenge. A currently much-favoured emotion.

‘Anger is, according to some, a transient hatred, or at least very like it.’

(SOUTH)

‘Brexit is, according to some, a transient anger, or at least very like it.’

(NORTH)

ARMADA.

[a fleet of war, Spanish] An armament for sea; anything Spanish in the popular news-sheets; by extension, any European Union action or proposal viewed with disfavour by Brexiteers.

‘an Armada of European regulations’

(YE DAILY CHAIN MAIL)

‘the Euro armada of red tape’

(THE DAILY DEPRESSED)

ARRANT.

[Uncertain etymology, but probably from errant, which being at first applied in its proper signification to vagabonds, as an errant or arrant rogue, that is, a rambling rogue, lost, in time, its original signification, and, being by its use understood to imply something bad, was applied at large to any thing that was mentioned with hatred or contempt.] Bad in high degree.

‘A vain fool grows forty times an arranter sot than before.’

(L’ESTRANGE’S FABLES)

Hence arrant as epithet for a knave who delivers rambling rants, as ‘Arrant Banks held forth afresh on Brexit.’

(ADDIDSON)

ASLEEP.

Sleeping; at rest; hence undisturbed by any concern for action or events.

‘How many thousands of my poorest subjects

Are at this hour asleep!’

(SHAKESPEARE)

‘How many of my poorest ministers

Are at this hour asleep!’

(GOOD MISTRESS MAY, IN SHAKESPEARE, DAFT FOLIO)

B

BAA.

The cry of a sheep.

BACKFRIEND.

A friend backwards; that is, an enemy in secret. So also in our recent politicks, front-friend, ‘Messrs Gove and Johnson were firm frontfriends.’

BACKWARDS.

From the present station to the place beyond the back; regressively. Towards something past. From a better to a worse state. Perversely; from the wrong end. So, BREXWARDS, regressing perversely to a worse, past state.

BARN, BARNIER.

A place or house for laying up any sort of grain, hay or straw. Hence a barnier, one who has a plentiful supply of last straws after all others have run out.

‘Prithee Master Barnier, dost have some straw for mine ass?’

‘Tush, Master Daffidavis, ’tis my last straw but thou mayst have it for thine ass.’

(BEN JONSON, BARTHOLOMEW MARKET)

In the current popular news-sheets, this word has led to some mirthful play upon the name of Monsieur Barnier, agent of France and other powers in these Brexit affairs (a name which has as a further indignity sometimes alternatively been punned with ‘Barmier’, after the cant and low word barmy).

BEEFEATER.