[Vwoolf] Fancy not knowing that!

[Stuart N. Clarke]

I have to admit that I thought the same about pirate buses.  One of our VWSGB Members told me.  Now I’ve discovered lots of info.  Below is the most famous: the “Chocolate Express”.

Here’s an example of something I didn’t know I didn’t know until I found out I didn’t know a few years ago:  what’s a street scavenger?  They pop up in T. S. Eliot’s ‘A Cooking Egg’ (1920): ‘The red-eyed scavengers are creeping | From Kentish Town and Golder’s Green’.  They are also mentioned in “The Years” and “Jacob’s Room”.

Answer: persons ‘whose employment is to clean streets, by scraping or sweeping together and removing dirt’ (OED).

Stuart



From: Jeremy Hawthorn via Vwoolf 
Sent: Monday, April 5, 2021 4:48 PM
To: vwoolf 
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] Fancy not knowing that!

It's a good example of what for many might be an unknown unknown: those unfamiliar with cricket might well assume that the nets are for tennis. (Another unknown unknown for me was the pirate bus in Mrs Dalloway - which before you contextualised it, Stuart, I thought was just a bit of romancing on Elizabeth's part. Annotators, I agree, need to be alert to the possibility of such ignorance.) The things we know we don't know can always be looked up; the things we don't know we don't know remain unresearched.


J


On 05.04.2021 17:23, Stuart N. Clarke via Vwoolf wrote:


  It was intended as a gentle tease of foreigners outwith the Empire – but also an implied criticism of annotated editions that don’t explain what readers might need to know.

  Stuart


  From: Jeremy Hawthorn via Vwoolf 
  Sent: Monday, April 5, 2021 4:10 PM
  To: vwoolf at lists.osu.edu 
  Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] Fancy not knowing that!

  I suspect you of playing "tease the foreigner" Stuart! I had a memory that when in Hollywood, Sir Cedric Hardwicke expected all expatriot Brits to turn up for net practice for the local cricket team, but could not find this on line. But I did find this, from around the time of The Waves:

  "The headmaster of High Wycombe Royal Grammar School, Mr. E.R.Tucker, in an effort to stimulate the interest of parents in school affairs, has arranged cricket practice at the nets for fathers once a week."

  Evening Post, Wednesday August 14, 1935



  On 05.04.2021 16:40, Stuart N. Clarke via Vwoolf wrote:

    When the boys are at school in “The Waves”, Louis “said”:

    “We are parting, some to tea; some to the nets ...”

    Alles klar?

    Stuart
    (Day 384)



     
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