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With more than 7,000 definitions, this book provides a definitive guide to the use of slang today. It deals with drugs, sport and contemporary society, as well as favourite slang topics such as sex and bodily functions. In this fully updated fourth edition of the highly acclaimed Dictionary of Contemporary Slang, language and culture expert Tony Thorne explores the ever-changing underworld of the English language, bringing back intriguing examples of eccentricity and irreverence from the linguistic front-line. "Thorne is a kind of slang detective, going down the streets where other lexicographers fear to tread." Daily Telegraph
A collection of speculative tales set in and around the beautiful Canary Island of Tenerife
A JOLLY DECENT CUPPA ... is a wonderfully entertaining compendium of the hundred words and phrases that have over the last century become the cornerstones of modern spoken English, and have been used - sometimes deliberately, but often inadvertently - to stake out the common identity that unites the English, to define what makes us who we are, and thus different from those beastly foreigners who lurk just off our shores. Despite attempts by politicians and writers, despite lessons in citizenship enshrined in the national curriculum, we have famously never been able to define for posterity precisely what Englishness is. A JOLLY DECENT CUPPA ... takes certain well-loved and crucial expressions such as sorry, nice, fair play, shag, common, posh, cuppa, chippy or the full monty, explores their strange and wonderful origins, and demonstrates with wit and charm how they are emblems of an era or an attitude, of a heritage and of the traits and quirks essential to all our notions of Englishness.
Are you a bobo or a wombat? Are you tempted by infobia or to kick dead whales up the beach? If your answer to any of these questions is 'What are you talking about?', then you definitely need a copy of Shoot the Puppy. Amusing, informative and newly updated for 2007, it guides the reader through the ever-growing heap of contemporary jargon from around the English-speaking world, showing where it comes from, what it means, and what it tells us about our contemporary world.
A century after Bram Stoker made the Vampire one of the most potent images in all literature, the cult of the undead is as alive as ever. Not only on celluloid and in the pages of fiction, but in the S&M clubs of New York City, in Midwest high schools and English pubs, across the forests of Puerto Rico and the jungles of Malaysia, the creature walks among us. In Children of the Night Tony Thorne provides the ultimate account of the history, meaning, and resonance of the Vampire, drawing on explorations in Eastern Europe, new theories of the origin of the Vampire and exclusive interviews with contemporary living Vampires, the very latest incarnations of a phenomenon which simply will not die.
When Tony Thorne first turned up for his medical in 1956 he had little idea of the adventures he would face and the people he would encounter over the next two years in service. Brasso, Blanco & Bull is the hilarious account of life in National Service, where 23339788 Thorne faced the horrors of basic training, the boredom of the drill yard as well as the unforgettable camaraderie of the squad. Praise: 'This book took me back more years than I care to remember.' Bernard Cribbins, The Parachute Regiment, 1947-8 'A great reminder for those of us that did it and a great treat for those that didn't.' Windsor Davies, East Surrey Regiment, 1950-2 'More Virgin Soldiers just like the ones I remember. This lot made me laugh a lot.' Leslie Thomas, Royal Army Pay Corps 1949-51 'I thoroughly enjoyed the read.It took me back to my days of national service, most of which I enjoyed!' Freddie Truman, OBE, Royal Air Force 1951-3
Englishness is an ancient and powerful concept, but no one seems sure exactly what it means in the twenty-first century. In exploring our national identity, Tony Thorne has compiled a fascinating compendium of the hundred words and phrases that have become the cornerstones of modern English, and have been used - sometimes deliberately, but often inadvertently - to stake out our common ground, to define what makes us essentially English, and thus different from those beastly foreigners who lurk just off our shores.
Ever since Albert Einstein's General Theory of Relativity burst upon the world in 1915, some of the world's most brilliant minds have sought to decipher the mysteries bequeathed by that legacy. Einstein himself was resistant to its implications, but physicists, astronomers and cosmologists have argued over his theory ever since.
Clever kids discuss Life, the Universe and just about everything ... including Computers, Aliens, the Future, Time Travel, Politics, Religion etc.
Includes "...slang from today's English speaking world ...words and phrases made famous or fashionable by films, television, novels, magazines and pop-songs - from thieves' cant to Cockney rhyming slang, American street talk to Sloane Rangerisms..."