Gervase Phinn: Blunders spell humour

"The picture caption which stated that 'the District Governor of the Rotary Cub is seen here greeting the President of the United States' should have read 'the District Governor of the Rotary Cub is seen here greeting the President of the Soroptimist Club'.''

I recall a misprint in my local paper when the cook at my children's school, who deservedly had won an award, was pictured with the caption: "School chef cocks up a feast for children."

I keep in my file of bits and pieces, the letter sent to parents and signed: "Yours sincerely, Mr Smith, Deputy Deadteacher" and a copy of one received by the chairman of governors and the local rector, beginning, "Dear Rectom".

When I worked in North Yorkshire, Harrogate Grammar School decided to celebrate a centenary with a specially commissioned mug with the name of the school proudly emblazoned on the front. Unfortunately, the mugs arrived (and were speedily returned, I should add) with "Harrogate Grammer School" on the front of them.

There but for the grace of God, of course, go we all. Recently, I submitted the manuscript to the Dalesman of my new book: Gervase Phinn's Yorkshire Journey. Mark, my editor, forwarded me the following note: "I thought you might like these misprints in the York section of your book, which our proof reader spotted and which we have corrected, of course."

"The teacher and her class of seven- and eight-year-olds, who had travelled from a tiny village primary school in the heart of the Dales, stood in the centre of the great cathedral. They all stared at the great East Window, the largest medieval stained-glass widow in Europe, the size of a double tennis court."

There was another misprint: "Some of England's fiercest and bloodiest battles have been fought on the flat land around York, decisive ballets like Stamford Bridge, Towton and Marston Moor to name but three."

I blame the spill-chucker! It's not just on the printed page that words become altered and change their meaning. With the spoken word we have spoonerisms and malapropisms. The Reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844-1930) was the warden of New College, Oxford who came up with nonsensical statements like: "The weight of rages will press hard upon the employer." What he meant was the rate of wages.

Mrs Malaprop is a character in Richard Brinsley Sheridan's 1775 play The Rivals, a woman who warns, "If ever you betray what you are entrusted with... you forfeit my malevolence for ever..." And says, "My affluence over my niece is very small". Mrs Malaprop had a long lineage. One of her ancestors was Constable Dogberry in Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing.

And her best known modern successor was Hylda Baker, whose stage act included the presence of her huge stooge, Cynthia, usually a man in drag. After putting another piece of mangled logic to the mute Cynthia and receiving no reply, Hylda would fix a beady eye on the audience and say: "She knows y'know."

YP MAG 22/5/10