I'm not sure if this is the section place to put this, but...
Can anyone recommend me an English film from the 1950s that really captures the clipped posh accents of the era...so I'm talking middle class on up...preferably set in London.
I tried Genevieve but it wasn't quite posh enough. It's too hearty.
To give you some idea what I'm looking for, here's a clip of Elizabeth Allan visiting Harrods, up until it starts to talk about tea:-
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFmC8sljakg]YouTube - Going Shopping with Elizabeth Allan (1955) - extract[/ame]
A Canterbury Tale (1944)
Not any of the main characters. But towards the end of the film (last quarter), when Alison (Sheila Sim) is walking through bombed out Canterbury, she stops a passer by to check where everything is.
That woman, Kathleen Lucas, has got the cut-glassest of cut-glass accents
Steve
Haha - what a great clipIt reminds me of taking my kids to Harrods last year on a trip. I explained to them (like in the film) 'this is most famous and quite possibly the best shop in the world!' Then someone heard me and laughed uproariously and we went up the escalator past the mad Al Fayed sculptures..and anyway, they weren't convinced. I love it though - but �65 for high tea in Harrods - for one! My boyfriend at the time called me a lapse socialist for wanting two.
Anyway - what about something with Joyce Grenfell? Her accent is upper class to the core I hear (although her mother was American wasn't she?)
name='MB']....Anyway - what about something with Joyce Grenfell? Her accent is upper class to the core I hear (although her mother was American wasn't she?)
Yes, she was - and what difference would that make?
Churchill's mother was American as well. He doesn't sound like any American I have ever known....
And Joyce Grenfell's voice varied a lot depending on which character she was portraying. Her normal speaking voice wasn't overly "posh", just normal BBC English for the time. But when she was doing her character sketches she could put on a range of accents, including foreign ones. Mainly done by mimicry because she had a good ear for musicname='TimR']Yes, she was - and what difference would that make?
Churchill's mother was American as well. He doesn't sound like any American I have ever known....
Steve
Thanks for that clip swinginglondon........love those old shorts, as for Harrods you need a battering ram to walk around the ground floor on a weekend these days!
I'm trying to think of Thespians of the era with 'posh' if not 'clipped' tones, Margaret Leighton came to mind, maybe a film like 'The Constant Husband', lot's of posh types in the cast of that one, then there 'The good die young' where she played opposite her real life husband Laurence Harvey and they're talking in a 'luvvie/dahling' accent to eachother though the storyline isn't really what you're looking for
The Constant Husband (1955) - Full cast and crew
name='TimR']Yes, she was - and what difference would that make?
Churchill's mother was American as well. He doesn't sound like any American I have ever known....
Well.. it might mean she doesn't come from a conventionally 'clipped' accented family as I had thought. That kind of accent (described) is usually borne out of training or coming from a very specific background.
I don't, entirely, understand how accents work out at all. My son speaks with a slight London accent even though he left there when he was three and my daughter doesn't have a trace of a local accent, whereas, I have picked up a slight one which appears on occasion and she has never lived anywhere else. But, mostly, in the UK, people seem to speak similiarly to their parents - or it has some effect on how they speak...particularly if they are from a middle or upper class background - just an observation.
Zoe Wanamaker has very slight transatlantic intonation..
I am fascinated by accents, actually..it wasn't a criticism.
Billy Bryson writes about accents in the UK and points out how remarkably numerous and diverse they are within even small areas and social groups.
Thanks for the lead Mark O, but that film seems to be unavailable.
I saw a clip (unnamed), that fits the bill, on youtube from a Dirk Bogarde film...I'll try and find it and post it here and see if anyone can name it.
Interesting about accents. I live in Hammersmith, in London. Here the local accent is quite quiet, almost repressed and softer than in a lot of places,...but I notice when I visit Camden and go into Sainsbury's the local accents are much grittier and people talk much more loudly and are more spririted...more classic cockney, I think. But the difference is marked, even though it's only about four miles away.
\are you really saying that there is a variety of accents within such a small area.I doubt it.I can always tell someone who comes from sarf london,but within North london the only way to tell is if a person comes from one of the multitude of ethnic communities in the area.
name='orpheum']\are you really saying that there is a variety of accents within such a small area.I doubt it.I can always tell someone who comes from sarf london,but within North london the only way to tell is if a person comes from one of the multitude of ethnic communities in the area.
Yes. The difference between North London and West London, I suppose.
Here's the clip of the Dirk Bogarde film I was talking about. It's called 'For Better, For Worse' and is (typically) unavailable.
Anyway, the bit I'm talking about is at 5:30 in this clip.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaEgqhTXgI8&feature=channel_page]YouTube - Arena - The Private Dirk Bogarde Part One [5/6][/ame]
I have worked in Ealing,near the studios,but have never noticed any accent that differed from North London.
Lost with David Farrar is on More 4 on Monday. That has quite a good range of London accents some very posh indeed.
I'm intrigued (and rather surprised) at the thought that my voice might be immediately identified at South London though I grew up and have spent most of my life here. But then I worked in Hammersmith for years and didn't notice anything distinctive about the local accent - I'd be a terrible Prof Higgins.
in north london we say "south" but in south london it is pronounced "sarf".Many years ago i went out with an american woman living in Dulwich and she acknowledged that her kids were growing up with this accent.
name='orpheum']in north london we say "south" but in south london it is pronounced "sarf".Many years ago i went out with an american woman living in Dulwich and she acknowledged that her kids were growing up with this accent.
Well, I'd say Sarf if I was talking to North Londoners (because they tend to expect it !) but I wouldn't among my own kind
name='CaptainWaggett']Well, I'd say Sarf if I was talking to North Londoners (because they tend to expect it !) but I wouldn't among my own kind
I think there are many factors - but my children and their friends speak either local dialect or generic 'middle class' dependant on their parents.
I went to school in South West London where just about everyone came from 'somewhere else' and there was a range of variations on 'sarf west London', depending on where your parents came from - just in my class - West Indies, Morrocco, Iraq, Ireland and Pakistan. It did us an awful lot of good and I really value that experience - but, to be honest - all the working class kids came out talking as they had, at some point in the past, relocated from downtown Jamaica - no matter where they came from as it was considered 'cool' - as in 'Ali G'.
This all sounds a bit like Professor Higgins in MFL.
If it's plummy accents you want - in my humble opinion you need to look no further than Michael Dennison and his missus, Dulcie Gray.
As far as acquiring accents is concerned, whether from neighbourhoods or parents - I can quote two of many examples.
I know a couple of Bangladeshi lads in their teens. Both born and raised in Hyde near Manchester. They have an interesting mixture of Asian and Mancunian in their accents. Presumably the influences of the family home crossed with the non-Asian people they mix with in the community gives them this unique accent.
An example of the environment altering an accent comes from a pal who moved from Manchester to Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire around ten years ago. He has now completely lost his northern accent and you would swear he was born and bred in Hemel!
One group of people who never seem to lose their accents, wherever they live seem to be the Scots.
London isn't a small area. It's bigger in area than many countiesname='orpheum']\are you really saying that there is a variety of accents within such a small area.I doubt it.I can always tell someone who comes from sarf london,but within North london the only way to tell is if a person comes from one of the multitude of ethnic communities in the area.
Remember Professor Henry Higgins from Pygmalion (& My Fair Lady). He claimed to be able to tell which district of London (or even which street) someone came from by their accent, and it's not that ridiculous a claim. Maybe more so in his day, but there are still a wide variety of accents in London. Many of them do come from the person's family and ethnic bbackground but many of the accents used in the street or at school when kids are together are particular and peculiar to that area. London is really a collection of small towns and villages all crammed in together
Telling if they come from norf, sarf, east or west Lundon is easy, the refined and practised ear can narrow it down even more than that. Do they come from Dalston or Tottenham? From Wimbledon or Streatham?
Steve
How kids speak to their parents is often quite different to how they speak to each other when their parents aren't aroundname='MB']I think there are many factors - but my children and their friends speak either local dialect or generic 'middle class' dependant on their parents.
Steve
name='Steve Crook']London isn't a small area. It's bigger in area than many counties
Remember Professor Henry Higgins from Pygmalion (& My Fair Lady). He claimed to be able to tell which district of London (or even which street) someone came from by their accent, and it's not that ridiculous a claim. Maybe more so in his day, but there are still a wide variety of accents in London. Many of them do come from the person's family and ethnic bbackground but many of the accents used in the street or at school when kids are together are particular and peculiar to that area. London is really a collection of small towns and villages all crammed in together
Telling if they come from norf, sarf, east or west Lundon is easy, the refined and practised ear can narrow it down even more than that. Do they come from Dalston or Tottenham? From Wimbledon or Streatham?
Steve
But in Prof Higgins' day, people were much less mobile. Eliza Dolittle commuted from Lisson Grove to Covent Garden but many of her neighbours wouldn't have gone further than Church Street market. Nowadays it's rare to find someone who stays in the same neighbourhood all their life - in my department of 10 people, only 2 of us are native Londoner, though 8 of us are English. And, crucially, there weren't any films or tv back in 1912 so while Eliza might have heard American tourists, very few teens would have had the chance to adopt a fake US accent. And I still don't think you could pin down my accent to my postcode...
Back on topic - anything with Valerie Hobson or Celia Johnson will give you a good idea of English as she was spoke in elocution classes.
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