Remember how as a child, you were afraid of the dark? Afraid of ghosts, ghouls, and monsters under the bed or in the closet? You never saw one, did you? Thats because, a long time ago, a little hero named Inky Pinky took care of that. How did he do it? you ask. With magic, no less. Thats why you, or any other child, do not ever have to be afraid of the dark again.
Learn the origins of popular phrases in the English language through this exciting book of games perfect for language lovers. Do you know the connection between the expression A HARROWING EXPERIENCE and agriculture, between BY AND LARGE and sailing, between GET YOUR GOAT and horses, or between STEAL YOUR THUNDER and show business? You probably have heard the comparisons HAPPY AS A CLAM, SMART AS A WHIP, PLEASED AS PUNCH, DEAD AS A DOORNAIL—but have you ever wondered why a clam should be happy, a whip smart, punch pleased, and a doornail dead? Through the fifty games included in The Play of Words you'll discover the answers to these questions as well as hundreds of other semantic delights that repose in our marvelous English language.
After a multi-decade career of stimulating readers to appreciate and laugh at the glories and oddities of our English language, beloved language maven Richard Lederer has collected his very best and most popular pieces in Word Wizard. In this career-capping anthology the reader will find essays that enlighten, inspire, and tickle the funny bone. From his hilarious bloopers to his hymns of praise to the English language, these essays are the brightest gems of a storied career. Word Wizard includes a new introduction, prefaces for each essay, sprightly verse, and material never before published in Leader's language books. With classic chapters such as "The World According to Student Bloopers," "English Is a Crazy Language," and "The Case for Short Words," and shiny new essays such as "The Way We Word" and "Add Wealth to Your Vocabulary," Word Wizard is sure to delight language lovers and Lederer fans everywhere.
Thirty-six short stories: six each by six New Zealand writers: Katherine Mansfield ; Frank Sargeson ; Maurice Duggan ; Janet Frame ; Patricia Grace ; Owen Marshall.
Eeny, meeny, figgledy, fig. Delia, dolia, dominig, Ozy, pozy doma-nozy, Tee, tau, tut, Uggeldy, buggedy, boo! Out goes you. (no. 129) You can stand, And you can sit, But, if you play, You must be it. (no. 577) Counting-out rhymes are used by children between the ages of six and eleven as a special way of choosing it and beginning play. They may be short and simple ("O-U-T spells out/And out goes you") or relatively long and complicated; they may be composed of ordinary words, arrant nonsense, or a mixture of the two. Roger D. Abrahams and Lois Rankin have gathered together a definitive compendium of counting-out rhymes in English reported to 1980. These they discovered in over two hundred sources from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including rhymes from England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States. Representative texts are given for 582 separate rhymes, with a comprehensive listing of sources and variants for each one, as well as information on each rhyme's provenience, date, and use. Cross-references are provided for variants whose first lines differ from those of the representative texts. Abrahams's introduction discusses the significance of counting-out rhymes in children's play. Children's folklore and speech play have attracted increasing attention in recent years. Counting-Out Rhymes will be a valuable resource for researchers in this field.
Kids will love this cumulative and hysterical read-aloud that features a free downloadable song "I was walking down the road and I saw... a donkey, Hee Haw And he only had three legs He was a wonky donkey." Children will be in fits of laughter with this perfect read-aloud tale of an endearing donkey. By the book's final page, readers end up with a spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey Download the free song at www.scholastic.com/wonkydonkey.
This book presents a unique annotated collection of some 2000 playground games, rhymes, and wordplay of London children. It charts continuity and development in childlore at a time of major social and cultural change and offers a detailed snapshot of changes in the traditions and language of young people. Topics include: starting a game; counting-out rhymes; games (without songs); singing and chanting games; clapping, skipping, and ball bouncing games; school rhymes and parodies; teasing and taunting; traditional belief and practice; traditional wordplay; and a concluding miscellany. Recorded mainly in the 1980s by primary schoolteacher Nigel Kelsey, transcribed verbatim from the children’s own words, and accompanied by extensive commentaries and annotation, the book sets a wealth of new information in the wider historical and contemporary context of existing studies in Britain, Ireland, and other parts of the English-speaking world. This valuable new resource will open new avenues for research and be of particular interest to folklorists and linguists, as well as to those working across the full spectrum of social, cultural, and educational studies.
Most of the characters in this play are taken from real life. When war was declared in 1914, Charters Towers was a happy, carefree but tough pioneering town where all hands were needed on the land. However most of the young men go to war, traveling first to Gallipoli on the coast of Turkey. They were decimated there. The survivors and new recruits were sent to France. Before leaving, Pal , torn between love of country and the call to fight for liberty for all the world, meets Madeline, an aboriginal girl from the Dreamtime who decides to follow him through the powers bequeathed her by the great Earth Mother Eingana. Liberty presents herself to Pal during the war reviving him as the Eternal Soldier each time he is killed. Pals brother Fred also enlists and is killed on Gallipoli. In Charters Towers Freds love Jessica dies in childbirth. Mother, Father and daughter Millicent together with their friends, Kate, Ilene and Kitty try to go on with their lives. Young Pal, Freds son is raised by all these women but enlists in the second world war and is killed at Dunkirk but not before he and his English love Kathleen have conceived their child during the London Blitz. Kathleen carrying the pendant that Young Pal had made for Kate and returned to him upon his enlistment, travels to Charters Towers to deliver their baby with Kate. He is called Boy Pal. Pal, the eternal soldier, travels the world, receiving many visions of a global Eternal Justice who will eventually arbitrate the Peace and World Commonwealth who will preserve it. Pal returns to Gallipoli experiencing the continuing conflict between Death and Liberty. He secures the keys for Peace, returns to Charters Towers and gives them to Boy Pal and a young Madeline as they both receive the covenants.
The seeds of irreverent humour that inspired the likes of Wayne and Shuster and Monty Python were sown in the trenches of the First World War, and The Dumbells—concert parties made up of fighting soldiers—were central to this process. Soldiers of Song tells their story. Lucky soldiers who could sing a song, perform a skit, or pass as a “lady,” were taken from the line and put onstage for the benefit of their soldier-audiences. The intent was to bolster morale and thereby help soldiers survive the war. The Dumbells’ popularity was not limited to troop shows along the trenches. The group also managed a run in London’s West End and became the first ever Canadian production to score a hit on Broadway. Touring Canada for some twelve years after the war, the Dumbells became a household name and made more than twenty-five audio recordings. If nationhood was won on the crest of Vimy Ridge, it was the Dumbells who provided the country with its earliest soundtrack. Pioneers of sketch comedy, the Dumbells are as important to the history of Canadian theatre as they are to the cultural history of early-twentieth-century Canada.
