SPOONERISMS
Spoonerisms are slips of the tongue, named after the Reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844–1930), Warden from 1903 to 1924 of New College, Oxford, who was notoriously prone to this mistake.
William Archibald Spooner (22 July 1844 – 29 August 1930) was a British clergyman and long-serving Oxford don. He was most notable for his absent-mindedness, and for supposedly mixing up the syllables in a spoken phrase, with unintentionally comic effect. Such phrases became known as spoonerisms, and are often used humorously. Few, if any, of his own spoonerisms were deliberate, and many of those attributed to him are apocryphal. Spooner is said to have disliked the reputation gained for getting his words muddled.
Rev. Spooner, it should be said, was so displeased by all of this that he once remarked to a crowded audience, “You haven’t come for my lecture, you just want to hear one of those . . . things.”
He quoted 1 Corinthians 13:12 as, “For now we see through a dark, glassly..”
Sir, you have tasted two whole worms; you have hissed all my mystery lectures and been caught fighting a liar in the quad; please leave Oxford by the next town drain. (“You have wasted two whole terms; you have missed all my history lectures and you were lighting a fire in the quadrangle. Please leave Oxford on the next down train.”)
At a naval review Spooner marvelled at “this vast display of cattle ships and bruisers.”
He hailed the “tearful chidings” (cheerful tidings) of the gospels, and asked the congregation to sing with him “from Iceland’s greasy mountains.” (from Greenland’s icy mountains)
Dr. Friend’s child (referring to a friend of a Dr. Child)
“Three cheers for our queer old dean!” (rather than “dear old queen,” which is a reference to Queen Victoria)
And, the classic: “Mardon me padom, you are occupewing my pie. May I sew you to another sheet?”
“A nosey little cook.” (as opposed to a “cosy little nook”).
He is reported to have made a double screw-up upon once dropping his hat then asking: “Will nobody pat my hiccup?”
Mr. Spooner was one evening found wandering disconsolately about the streets of Greenwich. ‘I’ve been here two hours,’ he said. ‘I had an important appointment to meet someone at “The Dull Man, Greenwich,” and I can’t find it anywhere; and the odd thing is no one seems to have heard of it.’ Late at night he went back to Oxford. ‘You idiot!’ exclaimed his wife; ‘why, it was the Green Man, Dulwich, you had to go to.’
On meeting a widow, he remarked that it was very sad, “her husband came to a sad end. He was eaten by missionaries.”
Calling John Millington Synge’s famous Irish play “The Ploughboy of the Western World.
At a wedding: “It is kisstomary to cuss the bride?” (as opposed to “customary to kiss”)
“Blushing crow” for “crushing blow.”
“The Lord is a shoving leopard” (Loving shepherd).
“A well-boiled icicle” for “well-oiled bicycle.”
“I have in my bosom a half-warmed fish” (for half-formed wish), supposedly said in a speech to Queen Victoria.
“Go and shake a tower” (Go and take a shower).
Paying a visit to a college official: “Is the bean dizzy?”
When our boys come home from France, we will have the hags flung out.
“Such Bulgarians should be vanished…” (Such vulgarians should be banished).
Addressing farmers as “ye noble tons of soil”.
“The weight of rages will press hard upon the employer.”
"I am tired of addressing beery wenches" (weary benches)
He once stopped a student in the street, asking him, “Was it you or your dear brother who was killed in the war?”
Two years before his death in 1930 at age 86, Spooner told an interviewer he could recall only one of his trademark fluffs. It was one he made announcing the hymn “Kinkering Congs Their Titles Take,” meaning to say “Conquering Kings.”
More Funny Spoonerisms…
A dot in the shark (A shot in the dark)
A pot high would make me happy (a hot pie…)
A lack of pies (A pack of lies)
Annual shower flow (annual flower show)
At the lead of spite (At the speed of light)
Bad salad (Sad ballad)
Bass-ackwards (ass-backwards)
Bat flattery (flat battery)
Bedding wells (wedding bells)
Belly jeans (jelly beans)
Better nate than lever (Better late than never)
Birthington’s washday (Washington’s Birthday)
Biserable Mastered (Miserable Bastard – from the video game Escape from Monkey Island)
Blushing crow (crushing blow)
Bottle in front of me (Frontal Lobotomy)
Bowel feast (foul beast)
Britannia waives the rules (Britannia rules the waves)
Bunny phone (funny bone)
Cat flap (Flat cap)
Chewing the doors (Doing the chores)
Chipping the flannel (flipping the channel)
Cop porn (popcorn)
Crawls through the fax (falls through the cracks)
Damp stealer (stamp dealer)
Drain bramage (Brain damage)
Eye ball (bye all)
Fight in your race (right in your face)
Flock of bats (Block of flats)
Flutter by (butterfly)
Full bottle in front of me (full frontal lobotomy)
Go and shake a tower (go and take a shower)
Go help me sod (so help me God)
Guard hoeing (hard going)
Have you brought your sleeping bag?
Have you seen her suck dick? (her sick duck?)
He fills her hole with soup (soul with hope)
He’s a fart smeller (smart feller)
He’s not a pleasant fucker. (pheasant plucker)
His nose was Roman; his grin pure cheek (chin pure Greek)
Hiss and leer (listen here)
Hypodemic nurdle (hypodermic needle)
I don’t like parrots and keys (carrots and peas)
I hit the bunny phone (I hit my funny bone)
I must mend the sail (send the mail)
I’m a damp stealer (I’m a stamp dealer)
I’m shout of the hour (I’m out of the shower)
It crawls through the fax (falls through the cracks)
It’s roaring with pain (It’s pouring with rain)
Keys and parrots (peas and carrots)
Know your blows (blow your nose)
Lack of pies (pack of lies)
Lead of spite (speed of light)
Mad banners (bad manners)
Mad bunny (bad money)
Mean as custard (Keen as mustard)
Mend the sail (send the mail)
My zips are lipped (my lips are zipped)
Nasal hut (hazelnut)
Nicking your pose (picking your nose)
No tails (toenails)
No Wucking Furries (No Fucking Worries)
Nucking Futs! (Fucking Nuts! – from the movie Dickie Roberts)
Pit nicking (nitpicking)
Plaster man (Master plan)
Pleating and humming (Heating and plumbing)
Puke on (Coupon)
Putting the coarse before the heart (Cart before the horse)
Ready as a stock (steady as a rock)
Rental Deceptionist (Dental Receptionist)
Roaring with pain (pouring with rain)
Sale of two titties (Tale of Two Cities)
Sealing the hick (healing the sick)
Shake a tower (take a shower)
She is pure shitty (sure pretty)
She showed me her cool tits. (tool kits)
Sin twisters (Twin sisters)
Sir Stifford Crapps (Sir Stafford Cripps)
Sir, you are certainly a whining shit (shining wit)
Soap in your hole (Hope in your soul)
Soppy cheese (choppy seas)
Soul of ballad (bowl of salad)
Spork, fife and noon (Fork, knife and spoon)
Tarp as a shack (Sharp as a tack)
Tease my ears (Ease my tears)
The acrobats displayed some stunning cunts) (cunning stunts)
The cat popped on its drawers (dropped on its paws)
The road is full of hot poles (potholes)
The rutting season for tea cosies (the cutting season for tea-roses)
This is the pun fart (this is the fun part)
Tons of soil (sons of toil)
Too titty to be a preacher (too pretty to be a teacher)
Trail snacks (Snail tracks)
Trim your snow tail (Trim your toe nails)
Wave the sails (Save the whales)
Weed ’em and reap (read ’em and weep)
In 1956, presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson created one of the most famous intentional spoonerisms in this reference to Norman Vincent Peale (a controversial minister outspoken in his opposition to Stevenson): “Speaking as a Christian, I find the Apostle Paul appealing and the apostle Peale appalling.”