"basket weaving" revisited

James Harbeck jharbeck at SYMPATICO.CA
Fri May 25 03:32:04 UTC 2007


>I remember the U v. non-U issue from the '50's. There was also a movie
>on the topic, IIRC, starring the late, great Terry-Thomas. I may have
>it confused with the "Carry On" series.

It's come back up of late with the breakup of Prince William and Kate
Middleton. Apparently Kate's family were a bit too non-U for Wills's
friends. Her mother said "pleased to meet you" to the queen rather
than "how do you do," and she was known to say "toilet" instead of
"lavatory" -- so some of the Brit press took to calling the issue
"toiletgate". There was a tongue-in-cheek quiz on U vs. non-U habits
in the Telegraph. See
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/portal/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VDU1MUFT5YHURQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0?xml=/portal/2007/04/17/nosplit/ftkate117.xml
for an article and
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/portal/main.jhtml;jsessionid=KNVMJ2Z535AERQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0?xml=/portal/2007/04/17/nosplit/ftquiz117.xml
for the quiz.

James Harbeck.

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