Sunday
(0)You wait for articles on Dickens and suddenly, three turn up at once. Fortuitously, I have just concluded "Sketches by Boz", a book that recommends itself to the commuter. It is not a novel to take up, put down or plough through. Published in periodical form, it lends itself to the daily article or chapter, preferably read after Motspur Park and before Earlsfield, and, one likes to think, approximating the reading experience of the early Victorian.
One of the joys of reading Dickens is his written observations of life and lowlife in London, including the accents of the denizens of Seven Dials. Three women in a gin palace ("Scenes: Chapter V: Seven Dials"):
"Vy don't you pitch into her, Sarah?" exclaims one half-dressed matron, by way of encouragement. "vy don't you? if my husband had treated her with a drain last night, unbeknown to me, I'd tear her precious eyes out - a wixen!" "What's the matter, ma'am?" inquires another old woman, who has just bustled up to the spot. "Matter!" replies the first speaker, talking at the obnoxious combatant, "matter! Here's poor dear Mrs Sulliwin, as has five blessed children of her own, can't go out charing for one arternoon, but what hussies must be a comin', and 'ticing avay her oun' 'usband, as she's been married to twelve year come next Easter Monday, for I see the certificate ven I vas a drinkin' a cup o' tea vith her, only the werry last blessed Ven'sday as ever was sent. I 'appen'd to promiscuously, 'Mrs. Sulliwin,' says I-----"
The last time that I heard someone swap v's for w's and w's for v's was on 'Allo 'Allo - a pantomime BBC sitcom. This speech pattern was used to mock German officers during WWII.
However, the joke is on us. If Dickens accurately portrays the table talk of Londoners, then some of us used to sound a lot more German than we do now.
patrick o'brian, who had more than a passing interest in period detail has the wonderful preserved killick say 'wittles is up' on many occasions... so the usage certainly existed in the napoleonic era.
Posted by kinch at May 9, 2004 10:36 PM
Surely, Dickens era was long before WWI , the late 1800's., I believe. So your assumption that 'v's, and 'w's, being transposed originated with mimicing German officers, is a bit off he mark.
The late 1800's saw a great deal of immigration from Eastern Europe, and as the 'East End' was the poorest of neighbourhoods, that is where they tended to settle. Seven Dials was one of the very poorest areas, and and most of the residents were of foreign extraction, hence the 'v's and 'w's, getting transposed as they often are in German and other Eastern European languages.
I have Great Grandparents on my Mother's side who came from Russia, and on my Father's side, who came from Germany. I can remember - as a small lad - being amused by GranMa talking about 'going down to the willage to get some winegar'. All hysterical stuff, but quite par for the course at that time, and of course the 'and vot do you vont, young man', would have us rolling on the floor. This would be in the 1945+'s.
The East End has always been the starting point for the poorest of our immigrants, first Germans, then White Russians, Jews, (always Jews, there was always somewhere where they were being persecuted), followed by Hungarians etc, etc, The ever changing borders of Europe always ensured that there would be plenty of immigrants to replace the ones who had 'made good' and who had moved on to better lives.
Strange how history is repeating itself and we are now expecting immigrants from Eastern Europe again, although I am sure that the new influx will be very different from the originals of 1850. After all, there was no Social Security handouts in those days, you had to work to survive, and that is one big motive for developing your entreprneurial skills. It is interesting to note that most of the master butchers and master bakers in London had this immigrant background. also interesting that those trades were the ones that required the levels of 'work ethic'.
Posted by ernest young at May 9, 2004 11:16 PM
My knowledge of Dickens is restricted to films. I can see Alec Guiness as Fagin sounding just as you've written. Could the character have Yiddish, which is a sort of bastard German, as a first languge?
Posted by Mark Holland at May 9, 2004 11:54 PM
Not sure if you have been watchiung the Trollope on the Beeb over the past few weeks but I note that the incomparable ex-peeler Bozzel alway talks of Mr Trevelyan as 'Mister Trewellian'. Dickens it seems, was not the only one to note the dialect of London.
Posted by Gawain at May 10, 2004 09:41 AM
Could be just a Cockney thing, like all slang, just a local derivation, and as a previous post says ' probably due to a bit of Yiddish background'.
Posted by ernest young at May 10, 2004 01:41 PM
"We were the Alemanni, the hairy and dull witted barbarians from across the Rhine, or in this case the Rio Grande, jabbering away in a Low German dialect called English."
---Charles Portis, Gringos
Posted by Graham Laszlo at May 10, 2004 10:10 PM
