Passing English of the Victorian Era

You’re listening to A Way with Words, a show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

When I think of the term Victorian England, I often think prim and proper.

But boy, they had some great slang back in those days.

I’ve been going through a 1909 volume called Passing English of the Victorian Era, a dictionary of heterodox English, slang, and phrase.

And there’s such great slang in here.

For example, do you know what mind the grease means?

Mind the grease.

Mind the grease.

Don’t know.

It’s what you might say when you’re in a crowd and you’re trying to get by.

Mind of the grease.

Oh, weird.

Or how about this one, butter upon bacon?

Butter upon bacon.

Oh, this is one good thing after another?

Well, it’s sort of like extravagance.

I’ve seen it in a lot of books from that period, meaning just something that’s too extravagant.

It’s butter upon bacon.

And I guess today it would be somebody wearing too much makeup or their prose is too flowery.

It’s just too, too much.

And I love this one, too.

To walk in everlasting shoes.

I have no idea what that means.

To die?

No, that’s a great guess.

And to be buried standing?

I don’t know.

What is it?

No, to walk in everlasting shoes is to go barefoot.

There’s something so poetic about that.

So I have some more of these.

I’ll share them later in the show.

Groovy.

And the book is what again?

The book is Passing English of the Victorian Era, a dictionary of heterodox English slang and phrase.

And we can find that online, I bet.

You can find it online.

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