On Saturday, we published our first extract from Simon Walters’ hilarious new book on Boris Johnson’s unique way with English, exploring how the Prime Minister uses unfamiliar words to surprise, delight and bamboozle. Today, in the final part, we reveal some of the strangest, cleverest and rudest ‘Borisisms’ so far recorded…
Aryan bull pig
‘You can call me an Armenian chicken farmer or an Aryan bull pig, but don’t call me incompetent.’
Response to student magazine attack on his bid to be President of the Oxford Union, 1982.
Johnson’s family has roots in Turkey, which included Armenia in the days of the Ottoman Empire. The magazine also said he was a ‘pig, the victim of a hideous Nazi war experiment’.
Boondoggle
‘It is known to the politico-journalistic class as a junket, jolly, freebie or boondoggle; and which is classified, for the benefit of irritable taxpayers, as a conference.’
On an Anglo-Italian conference in Venice. Daily Telegraph, March 11, 2004.
Noun: wasteful project; a term originating in 1930s America.
Chip-o-rama
‘Stop this chip-o-rama rubbish!’
Reply to a Labour MP’s complaint that top universities take too many old Etonians. House of Commons, March 15, 2007.
Borisism, noun. Based on the proverb ‘having a chip on one’s shoulder’ — a grudge or sense of entitlement. In 19th-century North America, when two men were in dispute, a chip of wood would be placed on the shoulder of one and the other would try to knock it off.
Cursus honorum
‘My ambition silicon chip has been programmed to try to scramble up this cursus honorum, this ladder of things.’
On political ambition. Desert Island Discs, Radio 4, October 30, 2005.
Noun: the ascending order of public offices; from Latin ‘course of honours’.
Endocrine orchestra
‘She was blonde. She was beautiful… And she had just overtaken me… I wasn’t having it. If there is one thing calculated to make the testosterone slosh in your ears like the echoing sea… it’s being treated as though you were an old woman by a young woman… The whole endocrine orchestra said: ‘Go. Take.’
On driving an Alfa Romeo. From his book Life In The Fast Lane, 2007.
Borisism, noun. The endocrine glands produce hormones.
Epiphytes
‘When you hear Matthew Pinsent speaking, you feel your littleness. What are we politicians and journalists? Just… epiphytes upon our national culture.’
On the Olympic rowing champion Matthew Pinsent. From his book Friends, Voters, Countrymen, 2001.
Noun. A plant that grows on another plant.
Gibbering rictus
‘You feel as if your buttocks have been suddenly clamped by the leather seat… My face was being pushed back into a gibbering rictus as the G-forces kicked in…’
On the experience of driving extremely fast. From Life In The Fast Lane, 2007.
Noun. open-mouthed with fear.
Guppygate
‘You don’t know about Guppygate and you don’t care? Good. Let’s leave it at that. It is a tale told by an idiot, signifying nothing.’
On being quizzed over a secretly recorded plot in 1990 to supply a fellow Old Etonian, convicted fraudster Darius Guppy, with the contact details of a journalist so he could have him beaten up. Friends, Voters, Countrymen, 2001.
Hogwhimpering
‘Deep down, because of some peculiarity in our psyche, we think it rather admirable to get bladdered, leathered, rat-arsed and otherwise hogwhimpering drunk.’
On the attitude of the British to alcohol. Daily Telegraph, August 11, 2005.
Adjective: extreme drunkenness; from American English, ‘enough alcohol to make a hog whimper’.
BORIS ON CHURCHILL
Cachinnate
‘For three whole minutes [Churchill] stands there, while the Tories cachinnate and the Opposition benches try to make noises of sympathy… This is a disaster, a living death…’ Conservative MPs laughed at Churchill, while Opposition MPs supported him when he dried up due to a brain malfunction during a speech in support of workers’ rights in 1904.
From his book The Churchill Factor, 2014.
Verb. To cachinnate; to roar with laughter, from Latin cachinnare ‘to laugh loudly’.
Hypothalamus
‘Somewhere in my endocrine system something gave a little squirt — adrenal gland, pituitary, hypothalamus, and pow, I could feel myself being transformed from this shy, spotty, swotty nerd.’
On hearing the 1981 Rolling Stones song Start Me Up as a teen. From his book The Spirit Of London, 2012.
Noun. Part of the brain that stimulates sex drive via the endocrine system and pituitary gland.
Hottentot
‘The chap always says, ‘I am now going to call upon soand-so to say a few words’, and then for an anarchic moment you think, which words shall I say — Hottentot? Axolotl? Carminative? — and how few can I get away with?’
Boast about his speech-making. Friends, Voters, Countrymen, 2001.
Noun. Term used by the Dutch in the 17th century to refer to the Khoikoi, a nomadic tribe in Southern Africa. Axolotl, noun: nearextinct amphibian found in Mexico. Carminative, adjective/noun: drug that relieves flatulence; from the Latin carminativum, a herb used to cure wind.
Ker-splonked
‘Nothing excites compassion, in friend and foe alike, as much as the sight of you ker-splonked on the Tarmac with your propeller buried six feet under.’
After he was fired from the Tory front bench for lying about his affair with Petronella Wyatt. Daily Telegraph, December 2, 2004.
Borisism, verb. Humiliated; variation of ‘kerplunk’, the thud of something landing; also a game.
Maenads
‘A woman was sitting opposite me in a state of some dishevelment. She was extremely good-looking and had a tattoo of a butterfly on her bosom, but she was pretty far gone. Not since Pentheus was ripped limb from limb by the Maenads have we seen such drink-fuelled aggression from the female sex.’
Criticising Labour plans to liberalise drinking laws, after he was threatened in a pub in Carlisle. Daily Telegraph, August 11, 2005.
Noun. Drunken woman; Maenad, ‘raving one’, from Greek mainesthai ‘to rave’; Maenads were the female followers of Dionysus, the Ancient Greek god of wine. They would get into a state of ecstatic frenzy from drinking alcohol.
Panther
‘I’m like a greased panther, a coiled spring.’ Joking about taking part in a charity England v Germany football match.
His performance included barging headfirst into a German player’s stomach. Sky News, May 3, 2006.
Borisism.
Poule de luxe
‘I twanged the Winged Victory… as one might twang a tentative bra strap. Was there any of us who would not be affected by the beauty of the burred walnut fascia, the white leather seats as soft as the purse of some Saudi poule de luxe?’
On driving a Rolls-Royce. Life In The Fast Lane, 2007.
Noun. French poule ‘hen’, slang for prostitute; poule de luxe, expensive prostitute.
Reincarnated as an olive
‘My chances of being PM are about as good as the chances of finding Elvis on Mars, or my being reincarnated as an olive.’
The Independent, 2004.
Borisism.
Sandpapered
‘I mildly sandpapered something somebody said.’
On making up a quote about Edward II for an article in The Times in 1988. The Andrew Marr Show, BBC One, March 4, 2013.
Borisism, verb. To smooth over.
Swankpot journalists
‘The world ought not to be run by swankpot journalists, showing off and kicking politicians around…’
On why he entered politics. Friends, Voters, Countrymen, 2001.
Borisism. To ‘swank’ can mean to behave ostentatiously.
Thrumming
‘My realistic chances of becoming Prime Minister are only slightly better than my chances of being decapitated by a Frisbee, blinded by a champagne cork, locked in a disused fridge… I’m 47 now. I hear the thrumming roar of young men in a hurry. And young women, obviously.’
Hay Literary Festival, June 3, 2012.
Verb. Continuous rhythmic humming sound.
Ziggurats
‘It would be wonderful if people were attracted by the cradle of civilisation, the ziggurats at Ur and the hanging gardens of Babylon.’
Calling for the return of tourism to Iraq in a Westminster Hall debate. May 26, 2004.
Noun. Ancient temple built in what is modern-day Iraq.
Extracted from The Borisaurus, by Simon Walters, to be published by Biteback on April 9 at £12.99. To order a copy for £9.99, visit bitebackpublishing.com
From girly swots to puffed-up popinjays… Boris on his political rivals
Chateauneuf-du-Pape Cabal
‘We fought to keep London from lurching back into the grip of a Marxist cabal of taxpayer funded Chateauneuf-du-Pape swilling tax minimisers and bendy-bus fetishists.’
Speech at Conservative Party conference, October 9, 2012. When he became Mayor of London, Boris claimed to have found bottles of the vintage red wine in a ‘secret cellar’ left by his Labour predecessor, Ken Livingstone.
Cabal, noun. Secret political clique of Left-wing hypocrites; from Kabbalah, meaning ‘reception’, the Jewish mystical interpretation of Hebrew scripture. By the 17th century it came to mean a secretive political group.
Dobby
‘Despite looking a bit like Dobby the House Elf, he is a ruthless and manipulative tyrant.’
On Vladimir Putin. Daily Telegraph, December 6, 2015.
‘Dobby’, the bald, floppy-eared, pointy-nosed house elf in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books.
Girly swot
‘The whole September session is a rigmarole introduced by girly swot Cameron to show the public that MPs were earning their crust.’
On the row over Johnson’s five-week suspension of Parliament to try to force Brexit through. Hand-written description of David Cameron in the margin of a Cabinet document, August 16, 2019.
Noun. Contemptuous term for someone who studies hard but is otherwise weak.
Mugwump
‘A mutton-headed old mugwump.’ Attack on then Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, claiming he was a threat to national security. (Asked to say sorry for the phrase, Boris replied sarcastically: ‘I apologise to mugwumps everywhere.’)
The Sun, May 4, 2017.
Noun. Mugwump: old, aloof. Originally from Algonquian Native American mugquomp, ‘great chief ‘. In the Harry Potter novels, Albus Dumbledore is Supreme Mugwump’; the word is also referenced in Roald Dahl’s Charlie And The Great Glass Elevator (‘my dear old muddle-headed mugwump’). Mutton-headed, stupid.
Puffed-up popinjay
‘We will not allow U.S.–UK relations to be endangered by some puffed-up pompous popinjay in City Hall.’ Attacking London Labour Mayor Sadiq Khan, a prominent critic of Donald Trump.
Twitter, January 12, 2018.
Noun. A vain or conceited person; popinjay, archaic term for parrot, potentially derived from the Old French/Dutch papegai ‘parrot’.
Snaggle-toothed lefties
‘Corduroy-jacketed, snaggletoothed, Lefty academics.’
Caricaturing British supporters of the Israel boycott. Speaking in Tel Aviv, November 11, 2015.
Adjective. Snaggle-toothed, having crooked, projecting teeth, from English. The phrase was in use as early as the 1580s.