Talk:Riddley Walker

Language and place names decoded

The following counts as Own Research by me, but it can be used as a first stop for further research for those looking for authoritative citations. I remember when the book came out there were several newspaper and magazine articles which clarified a lot of the place names (which are obvious if you have an Ordnance Survey map of the area, anyway). Also, whatever you may read or hear from people unfamiliar with rural Kent in the 1960s/1970s, the language in the novel is clearly based on the old north and east Kent rural dialects which were surviving at that time (though it does include Estuarine, and a slight taste of Cockney rhyming slang here and there). As far as I am aware, the old speakers of that dialect are all now dead. I lived alongside some of them near Canterbury for ten years in the 60s and seventies, and I can still speak it, a little. It had its own lexis, which makes it a true dialect in linguistic terms. A researcher came down from Leeds University in the 60s and recorded some of the east Kent dialect speakers whom I knew well. Those recordings are still in the archives of dialect at one of the departments of Leeds University.

For your information, the following is the list of place names which I decoded, using an OS map, in 1982, with the help of local dialect speakers (farmers who had been there for generations). Obviously you can't move it straight into the article, but it might help you find a citation for some of them if you are googling for that.

• Harts Ease - Harty
• Little Salting - Seasalter
• Widders Bel - Whitstable
• Horny Boy - Herne Bay
• Reakys Over - Reculver
• The Ram - Thanet
• Ram Gut - River Wantsum
• Bollock Stones - Bullockstone
• Dog Et - Dargate
• Fathers Ham - Faversham
• Rivver Sour - River Stour
• Roaming Rune - (Richborough?)
• Sams Itch - Sandwich
• Cambry - Canterbury
• Weaping - Badlesmere (in my notes I had guessed Leaveland, then crossed it out)
• Good Shoar - Deal
• Mole Arse - Molash
• Goodmercy - Godmersham
• How - Wye
• Pig Sweet - Pett Street Farm
• Nelly's Bum, - Nailbourne
• Widders Dump - Withersoane
• Bernt Arse - Ashford
• Brabbas Horn - Brabourne
• Hagmans - (Willesborough?) (Hinkshill has been suggested elsewhere, but the mapping does not fit)
• Sel Out - Sellinge
• Monkeys Whoar Town - Monks Horton Manor
• Dunk Your Arse - Dungeness
• Rose and Power - (Lympne?)
• Cripple the Farn - Capel le Ferne
• The Warnings - Warren
• Fork Stoan - Folkestone
• Do it Over - Dover

There has been a list on Eli Bishop's Riddley Walker Annotations site for many years. --Pfold (talk) 18:29, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree, but the problem is that it is apparently no more backed up by verifiable evidence than is my above list. Also, I don't think that his list is entirely accurate, as I have hinted above. Storye book (talk) 18:55, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

The point is that from the point of view of this article Eli Bishop is a third-party source, which neither you or I can be. Unless you can quote Hoban himself, you're not going to get anything completely unimpeachable. It's perhaps worth pointing out that Eli had quite a lot of personal contact with Hoban and has compiled a lot of Riddley-related material - he's not just a guy who spent an afternoon compiling a list. Look also at his long list of contributors & collaborators. He's as close to an expert as you're likely to find.

The obvious thing to do is to publish your own list elsewhere online and we can add a link to it. --Pfold (talk) 19:35, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

I have no wish to promote myself or my research, or to place myself as an authority, so I will not be putting my research online. Even if I did, I would not expect it to be peer-reviewed. It is just here for reasons explained above, and for anyone who is concerned that Eli Bishop is not peer-reviewed, and appears to have accepted contributions from at least some people he doesn't know, without question.

Also, all of his contributors whose backgrounds are described are in the US or Canada, whereas the novel is set in the UK, in an area which, at the time of writing, still had its own rural dialect (all speakers of that dialect are dead now, as far as I know). The language in the novel is very close to that old north and east Kent dialect, which reflected Old English and Old French syntax and vowels, and retained some lexis from those sources. Thus the language of the book is very easy for me to read (having lived for ten years in the 60s/70s with farmers who spoke the dialect). Most reviewers declare the language to be hard work to understand, which makes me question the authority of those who are unfamiliar with the language and places. Hoban was actually there, and got local help with language and places, as some sources say.

I have no right to declare myself an authority on this, but I do think I can question certain sources which depend on people unfamiliar with what Hoban saw and heard while in Kent. I am of course not arguing for the removal of any sources. However I do think that understanding of the book would be improved if we had more peer-reviewed researchers working locally, who have access to the library of dialect recordings at Leeds University, where examples of the north and east Kent dialect are kept. The recordings were made in the 1960s, and some of the farmers that I knew had contributed to those recordings. (They were proud to have been chosen for the recordings, and used to show off about it in the pub at Marshside). Storye book (talk) 10:39, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

I certainly don't wish to suggest that Eli Bishop's list is of free of error or that you have nothing to contribute. However, while his list may not have been peer-reviewed in the strict academic sense, it has been available for scrutiny and updating for many years (at least 15, to my knowledge) and Eli Bishop was certainly in contact with Hoban, though of course I've no idea whether Hoban offered comments. It seems to me your best option is to offer your improvements to Eli Bishop - http://www.errorbar.net/contact.php --Pfold (talk) 11:19, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Thank you. I'll think about it. Storye book (talk) 11:43, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Or you could offer your own to list as it stands to http://www.russellhoban.org/ --Pfold (talk) 12:32, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Thank you. I'm not really thinking about putting myself out there right now. I just put that above list up there for WP researchers to check out if they wanted to. You never know, in the future there may be citations for it, or citations for something with better ideas. But again, I'll think about it. Anyone is welcome to use the above list and post it where they like, and they can credit me with the 1982 research if they like. You read it here, folks. Storye book (talk) 20:49, 5 December 2022 (UTC)