Tuesday 5 September 2017

Bludgers

To reiterate: here at Blog Central, we compare Poul Anderson's Dominic Flandry to Ian Fleming's James Bond and also regard SM Stirling as a worthy colleague and successor of Poul Anderson - although the title of this post does not describe any of these gentlemen. Thus, we are not wandering too far off the reservation if we trace some connections between a novel by Fleming and one by Stirling.

Stirling shows us some Japanese, then some Australians (see here), whereas Fleming shows us an Australian in Japan (see here).

Dikko Henderson intones:

"'I bludge,
"'Thou bludgest,
"'He bludges,
"'We bludge,
"'You bludge,
"'They all bludge.'"
-Ian Fleming, You Only Live Twice (London, 1966), 3, p. 36.

A sergeant shouts:

"'Out off the fucking way, you bludgers!'"
-SM Stirling, The Golden Princess (New York, 2015), Chapter Four, p. 76.

For the meaning of "to bludge," either google or read Fleming, op. cit., p. 37.

Blogging is completely unpredictable. There was no way that I could have known in advance that an Australian insult would appear in both a Bond novel and an Emberverse novel.

6 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

Ha! The exasperated impatience of sergeants seems eternal! I'm sure similar non coms of Julius and Augustus Caesar were just as tough and rough.

Sean

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I forgot to add that I may have read somewhere that Australian slang has its origins in the Cockney slang or dialect of London.

Sean

David Birr said...

Paul:
Off-the-wall fact: in the *Harry Potter* books, in the magical game Quidditch, "players of both teams are attacked indiscriminately by the two Bludgers, round, jet black balls made of iron that fly around violently, trying to knock players off their brooms. It is the Beaters' job to defend their teammates from the Bludgers; they carry short wooden clubs, which they use to knock the Bludgers away from their teammates and/or toward the opposing team." (Wikipedia)

S.M. Stirling said...

More precisely, a lot of Aussie slang owes its origins to 18th century and Regency thieves' cant, the quasi-dialect of the underworld. Contrary to longstanding myth, few people were transported to Australia for minor crimes -- usually you had to be a repeat offender. Not all of them were hardened habitual criminals who were members in good standing of the lumpenproletariat, but a lot were.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, DAVID!

Gadzooks! IRON balls? But iron balls like that can hurt people. They might as well be cannonballs! They should have been made from rubber.

Sean

Sean M. Brooks said...

Dear Mr. Stirling,

Thanks for correcting what I vaguely recalled of the origins of Australian slang.

Sean