Mondegreens: A Book of Mishearings - Jacquie Wines

Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands, Oh, where hae ye been? They hae slain the Earl Amurray, And Lady Mondegreen. This was the poem that led to the coining of the term 'Mondegreen', which refers to a mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase based on it sounding similar to something else . The term came about because for many years, a writer named Sylvia Wright was upset about the brutal slaying of Lady Mondegreen - until she realised that the actual line in the poem was 'and laid him on the green'. This book, written by J.A Wines is simply a collection of various Mondegreens, mostly acompanied by short anecdotes ...  Read the complete review

"I'm very glad the Iranian ostrich crisis is now at an end..." "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us some email..." These are examples of Mondegreens, the subject of a book with the same name By J A Wines, a collection of several hundred of them, contextualised in anecdotes and quotations. Mondegreens are mishearings (sometimes innocent, often malicious) of things said (or, more often, sung) by people in the public eye. These mishearings can lead to bizarre, surreal and often quite smutty misinterpretations. The name itself was coined in the fifties by American writer, Sylvia Wright. When she was an ...  Read the complete review