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Suite Scarlett
Martin family birthday breakfasts followed a strict tradition. First, there were Belgian waffles, made by Belinda, the beloved Hopewell Hotel cook. These were served up with an array of toppings: chocolate syrup, fresh lemon whipped cream, stewed strawberries, and powdered vanilla sugar. The air should have been thick with wafflely perfume. Instead, there was an acrid, confusing smell, undercut by a light touch of smoke.
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Writer in Residence
Back writing after a weekend of talking and signing
I did the first three events of the publicity round for LORD SUNDAY over the weekend, in various parts of Sydney. They were all very well attended, much to my relief. While I’ve been fortunate in recent years, earlier on in my career I have done talks for audiences of two or three, and even a few signings with no customers at all. While this gives you time for a nice cup of tea and a chat with the booksellers, it isn’t what anyone would like and makes the prospect of the next one even more daunting. So thank you to everyone who came out on a very rainy Saturday and Sunday to buy books, listen to me talk and get books signed.
Interestingly, “signing” is a word I often mistype as “singing”. So I have to be careful that I don’t accidentally post an event where I will be “singing” instead of signing. I have a number of other words I always mistype and have to check, including tattogey*, jobbernoll** and eeler-whack***
From the last three words, it is probably easy to tell that I have been looking at one of my more obscure reference books, A DICTIONARY OF THE UNDERWORLD: BEING THE VOCABULARIES OF CROOKS, CRIMINALS, RACKETEERS, BEGGARS AND TRAMPS, CONVICTS, THE COMMERCIAL UNDERWORLD, THE DRUG TRAFFIC, THE WHITE SLAVE TRAFFIC AND SPIVS.
I think it also has the longest sub-title of any book I own . . .
* A dice cloth used by cheats with loaded dice
** a simpleton
*** a confidence trickster
3 Responses to “Back writing after a weekend of talking and signing”
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I read recently that ’spiv’ is backslang for VIPS.
In a funny way, this makes me think about VIPs in a different way.
The 18th and 19th century slang is so inventive.
I’m so adding ‘Jobbernoll’ to my everday vocabulary. Truly an awesome word. Right up there with fustilarian (for which I can thank Shakespeare).
I can sympathize, my brain refused to proccess the word ‘rhythm’, in my two years of music classes. OK, maybe not so exotic, but pretty annoying all the same.
Unfortunately, I’d doubt the back-slang derivation from VIP, as spiv predates the use of VIP by about sixty years. According to my DICTIONARY OF THE UNDERWORLD it came into use in the 1890s and may have come from the dialect term spif(f) meaning “smart, clever, dandified”.