I said I would say something about audible punctuation. This is it.
I like it when people put emphasis on the last letter of a word at the end of a sentence. The letters T and P are the most common, and usually denote a full stop. Not any old full stop, but one which is imbued with a challenge to find fault in the logic of an argument (as if!), or simply to add a certain finality to a statement. A good example of this is when the old caretaker of Hogwarts sends the naughty children into the forest having told them what horrors await them, finishing with, "Nighty-nighT". It is more of a sound really.
Ps work well too. If you tell someone to 'shut up' in a quiet voice, it adds a good dollop of disdain to the command.
Ws, Ss and Ys are a bit less elegant, but used to great effect by stroppy teenagers, as in 'No-wer!' when refusing to carry out a perfectly reasonable request, or 'Ye-ser!' when agreeing to carry out a request which they view as unreasonable. The 'yes' version is usually delivered after the fifth or sixth request with no response, and enhances the almost tangible display of exasperation brilliantly.
I am sure you can think of plenty of other examples.
Oh and by the way, this has nothing to do with Victor Borge.
ReplyDeleteI love the Victor Borge punctuation sketch, it's brillianT!
Delete(Love all Victor Borge, especially his Opera sketch!)
Margaret P
www.margaretpowling.com
Ha. I am old enough to know who you mean. Clever funny man. My pet hate is " Yeah yeah " Just yes will do. Fashion speak I call it, cos there will something else when that has worn off.
ReplyDelete'Yeah no' is quite fashionable now.
DeleteI love your beautiful language when it is pronounced the way BBC does it - and I melt for voices like Ian McKellen), but I also enjoy dialects (as in "Dalziel & Pascoe" for example).
ReplyDeletePS (both clearly pronounced here!): I sent a sms to your telephone number, but think that is an old one, Ye-SER!
I have only ever had one number Britta. I still have it.
DeleteIt ends in 665.
DeleteVictor Borge was still on our TV sets when I was a kid, but I can't now for the life of me remember how he spoke!
ReplyDeleteA quiet 'stop i𝐓' works wonders as well.
Austrian accent and lots of piano playing.
DeleteYou can see Victor Borge's sketched on You Tube (and I pronounce that Yew Tewbe, not Yoo Toob.)
DeleteMargaret P
I often wondered where your nighty night came from. It always seems so not yoÙ Sorry, cant do bold for the Ų.
ReplyDeleteYou-wer.
DeleteNever thought of that. I shall try it.
ReplyDeleteI would have thought you tried it as a teacher.
DeleteMy brain has exploded
ReplyDeleteIt's normally your arse.
DeleteNaughty, naughty, no need to be coarse.
DeleteMargaret P
Says who?
Delete