For a compendium of slanderous Elizabethan expressions, try Barry Kraft’s book, Shakespeare Insult Generator. There are more sources online for sneering Shakespearean phrases and randomly generated insults inspired by the Bard, perfect for the obscene rug-headed hornbeast in your life. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Shakespeare Insult Generator”
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
Grant, you thrasonical, self-glorious horn beast.
I beg your pardon?
You apish, leptus-leering abomination.
All true, but I don’t know what it means.
I am having so much fun with this book called The Shakespeare Insult Generator.
Oh, boy. They made that just for you.
One copy, it says Martha Barnette on the front.
I think he’s got your name inside.
It’s by Barry Craft, K-R-A-F-T.
He is a Shakespearean actor himself, and he’s done this really ingenious thing.
He’s made this flip book that has 54 pages, and each page is actually broken into three flippable cards, which means that you can mix and match them.
And these are all insults that Shakespeare used, insulting words.
And you have potentially 150,000 combinations that you can—
150,000?
Yes, by flipping the various cards.
So you get all these three element combinations, like Grant, you lumpish mouse-eaten geck.
That’s outstanding.
It’s really wonderful.
And one of the things I really like about it is that it’s teaching me all these words I didn’t know.
Like geck, for example, which is a dupe or a fool.
Yeah, and a thrasonical self-glorious horn beast is a boastful, self-glorious, low creature.
Oh, my goodness.
Yes.
My feelings are wounded.
Oh, no, no, they shouldn’t be.
What hast thou done?
Thou spongy, rump-fed rabbit sucker.
That’s a ton of fun, right?
It’s a ton of fun.
I’ll share some more later in the show.
But these are all from Shakespeare’s plays.
They’re all from Shakespeare’s plays.
And he’s got definitions for everything, so it’s no mystery.
Yes, yes.
So it’s quite instructive.
And I’m looking at it.
I see it in your hands.
It’s a well-designed book.
It’s artful.
It’s beautiful.
Yes.
It’s very beautifully done.
Highly recommended.
The Shakespeare Insult Generator.
Well, send us your insults to words@waywordradio.org or tell them on the telephone to 877-929-9673.
Or tell the world how much you hate us on Twitter under the handle W-A-Y-W-O-R-D.
