Is the Double Entendre in Rude Health?
Arthur Bostrom examines the origins, colourful history and new era of the double entendre.
Arthur Bostrom examines the origins and colourful history of the double entendre and asks if this comic device is upholding its reputation as a firm favourite or whether its popularity is starting to droop.
Novelist Angela Carter described a double entendre as 'everyday discourse which has been dipped in the infinite riches of a dirty mind'. Whether innocently filthy or gleefully subversive, this British institution is part of a comedy tradition which has made us giggle for centuries.
Bostrom himself is a purveyor of this custom, most memorably as Officer Crabtree in the popular television situation comedy 'Allo 'Allo, and in this programme he slips into a world of suggestive speech; including radio series, saucy postcards and advertising. However as he probes the use of double entendre he discovers it isn't always to everyone's taste - including his own.
He's joined by writer Perry Croft, Lecturer in film studies at the University of Salford CP Lee, Deputy Editor of Marketing Week Branwell Johnson, artist Jez Dolan, comedian Steve Bugeja and Dr Paul MacDonald, a comic novelist and lecturer in creative writing.
Produced by Stephen Garner.
Last on
More episodes
Previous
Broadcasts
- Tue 26 Aug 2014 16:00成人论坛 Radio 4
- Mon 1 Sep 2014 23:00成人论坛 Radio 4
From blunk to brickfielder: our wonderful words for weather
Digital body language 鈥 how to communicate better online
Coinages that changed the world 鈥 and some that tried to...
Ittibitium, borborygmus, and Ba humbugi 鈥 14 wonderful science words you鈥檝e never heard of
Download this programme
Subscribe to this programme or download individual episodes.
Keywords for Our Time
Series of programmes examining key phrases in public debate.
Smiley face: Seven things you didn't know about emoji
Some facts about emoji - possibly the world's first truly global form of communication.
The funny words that kids invent
Have a look at some of the fantastic words that children invent and reimagine.
Podcast
-
Word of Mouth
Series exploring the world of words and the ways in which we use them