by Mel Mcintyre

Created on: March 03, 2010

A spoonerism is a play on words in which consonants, vowels, or morphemes (smallest whole parts of a word, i.e. the root, prefix, suffix, etc.) are switched to create entirely new and meaningless words in their place.

It gets its name from the Reverend William Archibald Spooner, who lived from 1844 to 1930 and was Warden at New College, Oxford. He was famous for jumbling up words in this way and many of his quotations have become part of the legend of the English language:

• "The Lord is a shoving leopard."

• "It is kisstomary to cuss the bride."

• "Mardon me, padam; this pie is occupewed. Can I sew you to another sheet?" (Translation: Pardon me, madam; this pew is occupied. Can I show you to another seat?)

Spoonerisms can be intentional or unintentional and are commonly heard as slips of the tongue, or ‘tips of the slung’ as they are often spoonerized. It should be pointed out that many of the quotes attributed to Spooner are apocryphal, that is, of dubious origin. But that doesn’t make them any less funny, of course, including this apparently angry speech to one of his students:

• “You have hissed all my mystery lectures, and were caught fighting a liar in the quad. Having tasted two worms, you will leave by the next town drain.”

Which translates as: “You have missed all my history lectures, and were caught lighting a fire in the quad. Having wasted two terms, you will leave by the next down train.” (as in train down to London).

And here are a few more thought to have originated with Spooner himself:

• "Let us raise our glasses to the queer old Dean." – to the dear old Queen

• "We'll have the hags flung out." – flags hung out

• "Is the bean dizzy?" – Is the Dean busy?

Any manner of rearranging words in this order is considered a spoonerism. Modern favorites include the Canadian Broadcorping Castration (the CBC), the name of NOFX’s best selling album, Punk in Drublic, one of the late Kenny Everett’s most popular character creations, a blonde named Cupid Stunt, and a poem in Monty Python’s Big Red Book attributed to the Rev. Spooner, containing the line ‘biny little tirds.’

The British comedian Jasper Carrott has frequently performed his Spooner-inspired Bastity Chelt, in which every line contains a spoonerism of the likes of Unlick my pock. He also claims to have an aunt who refers to him as a ‘shining wit.’ The American pop group Wheatus released an album in 2005 entitled ‘Suck Fony’, a spoonerism created to show their feelings toward the Sony record label they had just left.

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