JB's new words interactive section

What does "hofey" mean?

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Search me.

Could you mean "hokey"?

hokey

adj. excessively sentimental; fake, artificial, contrived

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No such word thai I know

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Yes....oops...It's "hokey", I haven't realized that until I reviewed that bit of movie, Silence of the Lamb. So that's why I hadn't found it in all my dictionaries...

Thank you Smile

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How to say these symbols in English?

1. +

2. "

3. '

4. ()

5. []

6. {}

7. %

8. *

9. #

10. /

11. :

12. ;

Smile

quite comprehensive isn't it?

THanks, JB

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J-B wrote:

How to say these symbols in English?

1. + 2. " 3. ' 4. () 5. [] 6. {} 7. % 8. * 9. # 10. / 11. : 12. ;

quite comprehensive isn't it?

THanks, JB

1. Plus sign 2. quotation mark, or inverted commas 3. apostrophe 4. brackets, or parentheses 5. square brackets 6. curly brackets? 7. percentage sign 8. asterisk 9. hache 10. forward slash, or oblique 11. colon 12. semicolon

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Comprehensive too Smile

Hmm....I am trying to memorize them.

I have made some search on some of them. Regarding "#", I have only found "hash". Are both sayings just the same (considering their pronounciations)?

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That's the problem with non-UK publications. Trust the Americans to make a hash of things. :wink: Laughing

(they've done the same thing with cheque/check Smile

)

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McTag wrote:

That's the problem with non-UK publications. Trust the Americans to make a hash of things. :wink:

(they've done the same thing with cheque/check )

Er.. retraction...it seems I was the one making the hash of things.

It does derive from the French hachures but, having checked, it is now common (even in this country) to spell the name of that symbol # as hash

Sorry. I'm a bit too old-fashioned for my own good, sometimes Laughing

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Hi all. I am temporarily back.

Yesterday I watched the movie A Clockwork Orange.

I don't know what to say.

Sarcastic and stark to an undescribal realm.

Anyway there's something concerning English

First: What is a "clockwork orange"?
Second: What accent did the main character Alex hold? Was that Cockney? (The accent apparently contained a quite distinct vocabulary. It took me a while to realize that "viddy" meant "watch", malchik probably meant "hooligan" and so on)

Thank you

JB

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There is an idiom 'as queer as a clockwork orange' = i.e. something that doesn't exist. You may also hear 'as queer as a nine-bob note' (in Britain) or 'queer as a three dollar bill' in US.

Nowadays these phrases tend to mean queer = homosexual, but they used to refer to anything weird.

Anthony Burgess who wrote the book was a scholar, and he invented a whole teenage slang based on Russian for it. You have to read the book! Horrorshow = good, veck = man, starry = old for example. You may find a glossary if you google for it! Interestingly, Burgess said he regretted allowing the movie, as it appeared to glorify violence in some ways, and there were some disturbing copycat crimes.

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Anthony Burgess (author of A Clockwork Orange) is difficult even for native English speakers.
A lot of his language is invented, and more is very obscure, and I would not recommend him to a student of the language.
Some words in that book/film are taken from Russian.

I can't remember the accent used by the main character. Was it Birmingham/Midlands?

By the way, I loved Burgess's autobiography "Little Wilson and Big God"

Oops I see Clary has already repiled to this, and more interestingly too.

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Horrorshow...yeah that word. Very frequent in the movie. Means good? Well, that's very horrorshow! :wink:

Thanks a lot Smile

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J-B wrote:

Horrorshow...yeah that word. Very frequent in the movie. Means good? Well, that's very horrorshow! :wink:

Thanks a lot

Russian word, khorosho or something like that.

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Khorosho is "very good".

But I'm contemplating work Koroshi...

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McTag wrote:

Anthony Burgess (author of A Clockwork Orange) is difficult even for native English speakers.
A lot of his language is invented, and more is very obscure, and I would not recommend him to a student of the language.
Some words in that book/film are taken from Russian.

I can't remember the accent used by the main character. Was it Birmingham/Midlands?

By the way, I loved Burgess's autobiography "Little Wilson and Big God"

Oops I see Clary has already repiled to this, and more interestingly too.

I agree, great autobiography...but I think Clockwork is a very important book and movie.
Burgess didn't foresee the Internet spreading slang and styles...but soon
English will reflect his premonition

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been a year since I've seen my buddy JB? check out his first post in this thread...his English is now so amazing.
I loved this thread Crying or Very sad

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I WONDERED WHERE THIS POST CAME FROM.

Whoops CAP LOCK was on

I'd quite forgotten about it. Hello everybody. I'm looking for another good book to read, can't seem to find one at the moment.

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you and.. clary and jb...good stuff

how bout "The Gingerbread Mn by JP Donleavy?...I loved that book

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