Filthy English

Exploration of the English language is about the best reason I can give for posting this. Last night saw the official launch of Peter Silverton's Filthy English: The How, Why, When and What of Everyday Swearing, at the Sir Richard Steele pub on London's Haverstock Hill. The book's a learned, yet extremely entertaining, piece of work but it's contents are just too outrageous to repeat on a family blog. I'll give one example though. Apparently Tibetan swearing invokes the family but harks back to pre-modern practices. A common and very strong insult is phai.sha.za.mkhan - i.e you ate your father. More on Peter's blog.