"SPOONERISMS."
REAL AND UNREAL. Seeing that it is now being asserted that " Spoonerisms" have been mostly invented by Oxford students, and that Dr. Spooner, whose death occurred recently, was not tho begetter of such oddities as " You have deliberately tasted two worms," it is well to inquire how wrong attribution came about. The facts are supplied by Mr. W. L. Courtney, who was a Fellow of New College. In his reminiscent book, " The Passing Hours," Dr. Courtney wrote: "The real Spoonerism ... is not tho jingle which produces such abnormal phrases as ' Kinkering Kon'gs,' but it is a rather more subtlo matter. To give an intance: 'lf you bring forward that contention, I shall have to throw down the sponge.' That is a real Spoonerism. I don't mean that he made it, but that it perfectly .illustrates the sort of confusion between two phrases—to thrown down one's glove and to throw up tho sponge."
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Bibliographic details
New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20716, 8 November 1930, Page 1 (Supplement)
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153"SPOONERISMS." New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20716, 8 November 1930, Page 1 (Supplement)
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