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Thread: Major Barbara

  1. #1
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    Question Major Barbara

    Dear readers,
    I'm an Englisn teacher in Central Europe, and I got a task to do. There are some sentences, from "Major Barbara" by G.B. Shaw, as far as I know they are in Cockney English, but can not interpret them:
    1. Waw shouldnt Aw git a bit o me aown beck? Is it "Why shouldn't I get a bit of my own back?"
    2. Bly me if Jenny Ill didnt tike arter all. "after all" is all I understand.
    3. To serve you aht for ittin me acrost the fice. Is it "To serve you out for hitting me across the office"?
    and 4. Uve ad it aht o y---This one exceeds my thinking capacity.
    Can anyone help?

  2. #2
    Registered User kev67's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by James Logan View Post
    Dear readers,
    I'm an Englisn teacher in Central Europe, and I got a task to do. There are some sentences, from "Major Barbara" by G.B. Shaw, as far as I know they are in Cockney English, but can not interpret them:
    1. Waw shouldnt Aw git a bit o me aown beck? Is it "Why shouldn't I get a bit of my own back?"
    2. Bly me if Jenny Ill didnt tike arter all. "after all" is all I understand.
    3. To serve you aht for ittin me acrost the fice. Is it "To serve you out for hitting me across the office"?
    and 4. Uve ad it aht o y---This one exceeds my thinking capacity.
    Can anyone help?
    1. That's how I read it.
    2. 'Bly me' is a slang exclamation that just expresses surprise. I think the phrase derives from 'Blind me'. Is 'Ill' Jenny's surname? Not sure what 'tike' means. I would guess 'take', but 'talk' seems to make more sense.
    3. I expect 'fice' means face, but otherwise you are correct.
    4. "You've had it out of your" perhaps? What are the dashes?
    According to Aldous Huxley, D.H. Lawrence once said that Balzac was 'a gigantic dwarf', and in a sense the same is true of Dickens.
    Charles Dickens, by George Orwell

  3. #3
    Registered User mona amon's Avatar
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    Jenny Ill = Jenny Hill, I think.
    Exit, pursued by a bear.

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    Thank you all!!! The dashes I think for interrupting the sentence.

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