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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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Actually an excellent actor, but who is best known for UK fomrulaic comedy. This man was also a famous radio comedy actor and brought homosexual characters into the foreground when homosexuality was "not talked about"
He used Polari (palare) on the radio. This snippet is taken form another site:
Polari (also seen as 'Palare') is a gay slang language, which has now almost died out. It was more common in the 1960's when gays had more need of a private slang. When I started to research Polari, it was difficult to find any written material about Polari as what little used to exist was out of print. However, in the last few years, more and more people have been finding out about it, and several web sites and magazine articles have been written.
Polari featured heavily in the "Julian and Sandy" sketches on the BBC radio program "Round the Horne" in the late 60s, and this is how a lot of people first heard of Polari. A few words like 'bona' can still be seen in gay publications, used for camp effect. There are even hairdressers in London and Brighton called "Bona Riah".
Polari itself was never clearly defined: an ever-changing collection of slang from various sources including Italian, English (backwards slang, rhyming slang), circus slang, canal-speak, Yiddish and Gypsy languages. It is impossible to tell which slang words are real Polari.
In London, there was a West End dialect, based on theatre-speak, which was posher than the East End dialect, based on canal/boat-speak.
Here is a list of words I have put together from various sources. The core of the words are hopefully "authentic" Polari, but some will be just "any old" slang. Additions welcome.
Word list
ajax nearby (from adjacent?)
basket the bulge of male genitals through clothes
batts shoes
bijou small
bod body
bold daring
bona good
butch masculine; masculine lesbian
camp effeminate (origin: KAMP = Known As Male Prostitute)
capello hat
carts/cartso penis
carsey toilet, also spelt khazi
chicken young boy
charper search
charpering omi policeman
cod naff, vile
cottage public loo (particularly with reference to cottaging)
cottaging having or looking for sex in a cottage
crimper hairdresser
dish an attractive male; buttocks
dizzy scatterbrained
dolly pretty, nice, pleasant
drag clothes, esp. women's clothes
ecaf face (backslang)
eek face (abbreviation of ecaf)
ends hair
esong nose
fantabulosa wonderful
feele child
fruit queen
gelt money
glossies magazines
handbag money
hoofer dancer
jarry food, also mangarie
kaffies trousers
khazi toilet, also spelt carsey
lallies legs
latty room, house or flat
lills hands
lilly police (Lilly Law)
luppers fingers
mangarie food, also jarry
measures money
meese plain, ugly (from Yiddish)
meshigener nutty, crazy, mental
metzas money
mince walk (affectedly)
naff bad, drab (from Not Available For Fucking)
nanti not, no
national handbag dole
nishta nothing, no
oglefakes glasses
ogles eyes
omi man
omi-polone effeminate man, or homosexual
onk nose
orbs eyes
palare pipe telephone
palliass back (as in cpart of body)
park give
plate feet; to fellate
polari chat, talk
polone woman
pots teeth
riah/riha hair
riah shusher hairdresser
scarper to run off (from Italian scappare, to escape)
scotch leg
sharpy policeman
shush steal (from client)
shush bag holdall
shyker/shyckle wig
slap makeup
strillers piano
thews thighs
trade sex
troll to walk about (esp. looking for trade)
vada/varda see
willets breasts
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Attachment: W48.JPG
(Size: 28.63KB, Downloaded 369 times)
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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cchd
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Getting started |
Registered: May 2004
Messages: 16
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A bit of a carry on then 
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When playing Julius Caesar in Carry on Cleo and staggering from an assassination attempt:
"Infamy! Infamy! They've all got it in for me!"
I saw him once, many years ago, at a recording of the BBC radio show Just a Minute. Afterwards everyone flocked to the front for his autograph. But I was more anxious to meet Derek Nimmo.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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A right carry on. And his diaries were so infinitely sad.
To be fair he never admitted his sexuality, it was always "enigmatic". It also appears that he loathed it. I have put him here as a role model because, despite huge self created adversity, he was much loved by every sector of society.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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I think I preferred "Fantabulosa to vada your dolly old eek" in either 'Round the Horne' or 'Beyond Our Ken'.
Time for one of you to put this one to bed and find us another.
Polari allegedly vanished in the UK as homosexuality became lawful. Interesting form a net perspective that "troll" here means effectively to look for trade,and is nothing to do with bridges!
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Coincidentally I'm reading his autobiography at the moment.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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Did his fame cross the Atlantic, or was it a peculiarly British humour that he tickled?
A highly erudite man, cultured and witty. A truly huge contestant on "Just a Minute", where the contestant has to speak for one minute without hesitation, deviation, repetition, fornication or corruption.
Or, as it says here: "Ian Messiter, who had the original idea for the show, said he suddenly remembered a punishment handed out to him during his schooldays: if the schoolmaster noticed a boy wasn't listening during class, he'd make him speak for a minute without repetition or hesitation."
Time for one of you to name him and come up with a new one
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy wrote:
>
> Interesting form a net perspective that "troll" here means effectively to look for trade,and is nothing to do with bridges!
For those of us who go fishing occasionally, "troll" means using a revolving artificial lure ... apparently the same root, to do with revolving or going about.
Trawl, however, seems to be completly unconnected !
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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I am now visualising a revolving artficial lure! I think Prowler Direct?
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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No Message Body
The paradox has often been noted that the United States, founded in secularism, is now the most religiose country in Christendom, while England, with an established church headed by its constitutional monarch, is among the least. (Richard Dawkins, 2006)
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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And so it is! Over to you!
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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