BBC Swear Word Frequency Charts
A report titled Delete Expletives? by the Advertising Standards Authority of the British Broadcasting Corporation correlates various English swear words with how well they are perceived. Statistically, “c*nt” and “m*therf*ck*r” are the most offensive, while “bloody” and “god” round off the bottom of the list.
Thanks to the fantastic Ben Goldacre for digging this up!
Harry Potter Sequels in the Works
After selling 8.3 million copies in the US in just 24 hours, Harry Potter 7 is billed as the “the seventh and final book in J.K. Rowling’s magical series.” We, however, having read the novel, could not agree less with J.K. Rowling and her publisher Scholastic’s publicity-drumming campaign of artificial supply restriction. For we believe that there will be more Harry Potter novels in the future.
Now, if you haven’t finished the series yet, go away because we might ruin the ending!
A mashup of HP covers
There are two reasons that an author continues a series. One is the fun of writing the characters he’s dreamed into life. The other is money. For JK Rowling, Harry Potter offers her both opportunities, a temptation that we believe will be too hard to resist.
One of the Guardian Book blogs argues the financial point indirectly. They claim that over time the Harry Potter series will generate decreasingly exponential interest, and thus revenue. They hold out for a bright spot, but it’s true that Harry Potter is a series of big bangs and a short “long tail.”
The real indicator is that Harry Potter is still alive at the end of HP7. That last chapter, 19 years in the future, indicates that the world of Muggles and Magic still exists in basically the form it had before Voldemort emerged. The whole point of the Harry Potter series is a fight against evil, and once that evil is vanquished–as it is in HP7 without lasting consequence–the world returns to normal, fertile grounds for a sequel. After all, why introduce us to Harry and Ginny’s spawn unless you plan to develop them in the future?
The Eye of Argon by Jim Theis: Worst Fiction Ever
You can read The Eye of Argon yourself if you dare traverse such passages as:
Grignr threw his hands up to shield his face, and flung himself backwards upon his buttocks. A fuzzy form bounded to his hairy chest, burying its talons in his flesh while gnashing toward his throat with its grinding white teeth;its sour, fetid breath scortching the sqirming barbarians dilating nostrils. Grignr grappled with the lashing flexor muscles of the repugnant body of a garganuan brownhided rat, striving to hold its razor teeth from his juicy jugular, as its beady grey organs of sight glazed into the flaring emeralds of its prey.
The love scene which occurs at the beginning of the book is worse, displaying a completely inadequate knowledge of what “making love” actually is:
The engrossed titan ignored the queries of the inquisitive female, pulling her towards him and crushing her sagging nipples to his yearning chest. Without struggle she gave in, winding her soft arms around the harshly bronzedhide of Grignr corded shoulder blades, as his calloused hands caressed her firm protruding busts.
“You make love well wench,” Admitted Grignr as he reached for the vessel of potent wine his charge had been quaffing.
Protruding is usually not the right adjective to describe a sexy woman, but yet here it is. Read the whole thing for more juicy bits of TERRIBLE english!
Strange Names for Things
Check out this list of 33 unusual names for plain old nouns, featuring such goodies as:
AGLET - The plain or ornamental covering on the end of a shoelace.
DRAGÉES - Small beadlike pieces of candy, usually silver-coloured, used for decorating cookies, cakes and sundaes.
OCTOTHORPE - The symbol ‘#’ on a telephone handset.
SCROOP - The rustle of silk.
Honestly, I’d never heard of these and I question their use. But they are neat!