Fun: Alliterative Absurdities

Alliterative Absurdities

This comic poem originally appeared in the anthology Such Nonsense! edited by Carolyn Wells (1918). Try reading the poem aloud to appreciate the apt alliterations of the anonymous author.

If you caught a captious curate killing kippers for the cook,
In the cloisters with a club yclept¹ a cleek²,
Would you say he was as wily
As a cunning crocodily
Catching cockles with a corkscrew in a creek?

If you beheld a battleboat bombarding Biscay Bay
While the big guns bellowed bold from brazen throat,
Would you say it was as funny
As a bouncing blue-backed bunny
Blowing bubbles with a bobby in a boat?

If you saw a driveling dreamer drowning ducklings in a ditch,
And deducting data dry as dust to see,
Would you say that this death-dealer
Was of ducks and drakes a stealer,
Or of Darwin's dead ideas a devotee?

¹ An old-fashioned word meaning "called" or "named"
² A hook or golf club

 Source: http://grammar.about.com/od/rhetoricstyle/a/Alliterative-Absurdities.htm

Humour: Euro English

This piece of writing below illustrates what can actually occur if we simplify the English language pronunciation to reflect its actual pronunciation. It looks German to me!

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Euro English

The European Union Commissioners have announced that agreement has been reached to adopt English as the preferred language for European communications, rather than German, which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, the British government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five-year phased plan for what will be known as EuroEnglish (Euro for short).

In the first year, "s" will be used instead of the soft "c". Sertainly, sivil servants will reseive this news with joy. Also, the hard "c" will be replaced with "k". Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced by "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be Expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.

Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent "e"s in the languag is disgrasful, and they would go.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" by "z" and "w" by " v".
During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou", and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubls or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech ozer.

Ze drem vil finali kum tru.