Talking like it's 1932

[nineveh_uk]

I have suspected for some while that the government has a secret plan to turn back time, the Tories because they think everything has been going downhill since the Great Reform Act*, the Lib Dems because it's the only way they're going to get into government again for another century.

This afternoon, I received disturbing evidence that the plan may be succeeding. As I manoeuvred my trolley away from the supermarket check-out and towards the exit, I heard a young man* exclaim, "I say!"

I didn't think anyone, ever, said "I say"** any more. I am certain I have never heard anyone say it before. I would have noticed. I first came across it in children's books, and though it's absolutely ubiquitous in interwar fiction, it seems bizarrely unsayable now. I think I tried once, but felt like such an idiot even in the contemplation that I never did.

The world is reversing on its axis. It is the only explanation.

*Definitely not a hooray henry. Quite the opposite.

**Exclamation mark optional.

Comments

[ankaret]

You may be on to something. I've heard a lot of people saying 'My word!' lately. Though as far as the Tories go, I'm not convinced it's the Great Reform Act they want to return to so much as the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834.

[nineveh_uk]

Of course, the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 was only necessary because the end of fedualism destroyed the "we're all in it together" social contract.

[antisoppist]

I seem to be saying "gosh" an awful lot more than I used to but having been teased unmercifully at university for once describing something as "beastly", I would not want to risk an "I say".

Definitely not a hooray henry
I haven't quite got over once finding a Sainsbury's till manned by someone whose name badge read "Tarquin".

[nineveh_uk]

What kind of people actually name their son Tarquin? My mind boggles.

I did once see a wonderful billboard advert for a people carrier, of which the slogan was "The [people carrier]* for people who don't have a child called Tarquin".

*No doubt a more 'industry' word was used.

[antisoppist]

What kind of people actually name their son Tarquin?
Having just discussed it over dinner, I was reminded that it was Sainsbury's in Guildford. Say no more.

Also that it does not beat husband's favourite sentence overheard in an English supermarket, which was an elderly rural gentleman in Bridgwater asking his wife "How are we off for lard?"

[perennialanna]

I do say gosh, golly, and various other 1930s exclamations, but that is what happens when the child develops an unerring instinct for the one word in the sentence you'd rather she didn't repeat. I found myself having to explain at teatime today that I'd called the sitting room bloody because of the bloodstain on the carpet (from the baby's bitten tongue), which wasn't entirely accurate.

[cloudsinvenice]

Even my most poshly English relatives were last seen talking about "the absurd way people spoke back then", with regard to 30s/40s-isms (which they're old enough to remember). I have a sneaking love for "I say" and its ilk, but I can't imagine ever being able to actually say it unironically... having said that, I've acquired a few expressions that were originally ironic and gradually drifted into sincere use, so perhaps that's what happened to that man...