Stanley
Unwin
The masterlode of Stanfoolery of the verbally thrips oratory!
Stanley lived in a little
village in Northampton called Long Buckby, which was known for the boot and
shoe bespokey all lock stitchy in the leathery uppers,
deep joy of the footwear!
This is just a quick
site I threw together to honour one of our greatest entertainers Stanley Unwin
whose use of Unwinese
used to have me in
stitches as a kid when I first watched and listened to him. People who I know
that have met him said
that he was a smashing
bloke. I’m just so gutted that I never had a chance to meet him.
Please leave a
messagybold on the board lopper
If anyone knows any of Stans
relatives or has any info on him please email
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We are very grateful for John Brennan who put me in touch with “Prof” Percival who knew Stanley well and speaks Unwinese! See below for an article, which Prof wrote for a magazine.
“Prof” John Percival |
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Order special CD of Stan – |
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Samples of the
Great Man talking in Unwinese!
Stanley Unwin Thinking of
England
Just click on one of the links below to hear Stanley Unwin talk about some of
the different aspects of Englishness.
Links
- BBCi: Think of England - audio files of Stanley Unwin talking about some of the different aspects of Englishness.
- Professor Stanley Unwin - biographical information about the man who spoke perfect gibberish.
- Rotatey Diskers with Unwin - transcrebbers of throo and several performages by Professor Stanley Unwin.
- Stanley Unwin Explained - fan site for the master of the absurd.
- Stanley Unwin: Master of Nonsense - tribute from BBC News to the man who specialized in an unfathomable verbal style, replete with malapropisms and poetic gobbledegook.
http://www.compulink.co.uk/~ackroyd/lesbio.pdf
http://www.theheads.demon.co.uk/welcomeandnew.htm
http://www.nicholls.co.uk/newsletter/newsletter.htm
http://freespace.virgin.net/susan.gamble/Strangeness.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/obituaries/story/0,3604,633524,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,633562,00.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/england/thinkofengland/unwin.shtml
http://www.wubble-u.demon.co.uk/stan.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/entertainment/tv_and_radio/newsid_1759000/1759640.stm
http://www.hippy.freeserve.co.uk/unwin.htm
http://www.thecommentarybox.co.uk/issue35/unwin.htm
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Stanley Unwin Vital Stats: |
BBCi:
Think of England - audio files of Stanley Unwin talking about some of the
different aspects of Englishness.
Professor Stanley Unwin - biographical information about the man who spoke perfect gibberish.
Rotatey Diskers with Unwin - transcrebbers of throo and several performages by Professor Stanley Unwin.
Stanley Unwin Explained - fan site for the master of the absurd.
Stanley Unwin: Master of Nonsense - tribute from BBC News to the man who specialized in an unfathomable verbal style, replete with malapropisms and poetic gobbledegook
http://www.footballpoets.org/p.asp?Id=816
http://www.ronniescotts.co.uk/ronnie_scotts/ronniescotts/100/jul9.htm
Articles
ORIGINS OF JAZZ by PROF. PERCIVAL
What sourcey
originakers of Jazz musicolly, now there’s a questy-how?. My thorkus is
somewhere in the fardy-flung pastit and early human beals. in the deep forrey
junglodes, there was logger fallolloped dowder the florm. Thru timeworn
scarrage away insigold by beetloders’n’buggery, formit hollowed for echo sounding amplifiled. On passing thru,
knucklodes scrapey, bendy- ho of the early man, perhaps gathery a handy twiglet
nearby and accidently smotey-most and remarked the louding of the blow to the
loggers and therefore the first drum!. Well what a great discover to hail a
fellow for summery the tribal gathery and loggarythms for the dancy-jiggings
celebrale of these early specie.
Now thru time progressy, early whisloders from reedy beds, stretch-how catgut for plucky guitarmer or harpy, seashell an early trump and more to name if you wish, anyway the rudimental starters of all our modern instrumakers.
Well as for Jazz and its birth, there is a contradict for the truth, but somewhere between the deep sorrow progressy to stuffalode six foot throom undersoiled, then the celebrale joy of risey huff to heveral glory and sitteth the right ham sigold eternally, there’s a joy!. But then you say what of the jig’n’pokery of the naughty house and easy-speakers in the early twemps?. That is also thourkus food, musicolly for a good time by all, and why not, what about rent parties!.
Nevertheless it is a surefire assumation that jazz musicolly turnit upsile dowder music for ever. Whether tonic solfardy, contrapuntal modey, stavey notage manusribbled by the grates such as Bateyhove, Joan Barky, Trychopsky, Moteyharts, too many to tell, but such a far depart and new art itself. There is a deep joy expressy from the heartstrims of the player to communicapers to the eardroves of the peeplodes who receive it. Sideways lateral thorkus improviding from the cordial base, extempered
in full flow and instant is the corm or the art and transmitty the mood of the moment from suffery of the Blues to gladdings with the tapping toenabers of swingy-fast jitterbuggers. New Orleeners what a gift to mankile bestowed -Oh Yes!.
Who cannot apreciakers the leaders such as .Satchy. John Dodgey, Jacky in the Tea Garden, Woodman Herm, Artful Shorm, Ben Goodymamber and the boppy-mods, Charles Parky, Dizzy Glips, The Loans Monkey, Davey Brewbetter and Smiley Daves, many more to include addy finite em as to need throoty form pages to note, so suffice to say and cease it there.
So a deep enjoym of this musicool from major-blaskit spiitty throom of the trumpy,
tricklyhow clarineppers woodwilly, tromslidy huffalow dowd, caressy fingolds strikeit
pianum, saxaphobias, plucky fat belly basics, strumble guitarmer and banjolades, even catgut’n’scrafey the violimber (Steve Grabberfella), and back to origins, of “build it the shed” bash crashy symbold and kicky base, thrashy sticks snaring,
tom-tombola of the drum sets tempo. There’s a summery huff to explain in simplode form for your milode to understand it, I hope it’s all clearus muddy waters.
PROFESSOR
PERCIVAL High Chancelode of Miscilly to
the late Stanley Unwin.
Stanley Unwin
Comedian who had a special way with words
Tuesday January 15, 2002
The Guardian
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To say that Stanley Unwin, who has died aged 90, was a
comedian gives no idea of his unique brand of plausible malapropisms,
grammatical distortions and straightfaced nonsense. As a prewar BBC sound
engineer, he befuddled private conversations and entertained his children, but,
from the 1950s, he delighted a much larger audience on radio, television, stage
and in films.
Often
styled "The Professor", he would talk at length on subjects like
"What is the use of atoms?" or "How many beans make five?"
Very occasionally, his humour was rendered straight, as when he was asked about
castrati during a music lecture. "I'm not cut out for that sort of
thing," he instantly replied.
Unwin
was born in South Africa, the son of a feckless father he scarcely knew and a
mother who, on her return to England, dispatched him to boarding schools and
children's homes. At the end of that chilly time, he wanted to go to Canada,
but was sent to the Gibbs nautical training school, in south Wales, to learn
wireless telegraphy and sailors' knots. Briefly a seasick merchant seaman, he
got an engineering job ashore, but was fired after exploding some gas inside a
box his boss was sitting on. When he asked for a reference, his boss replied:
"Reference? I'll give you a reference - as a comedian."
After
joining the BBC, Unwin travelled the world during and after the second world
war. On a royal visit to South Africa in 1947, he was chatting with a colleague
at the hotel bar when a stranger barged in between them, his back to Unwin, and
interrupted the conversation. Unwin gently tapped him on the shoulder:
"What is the curriulode where the childers schools here?" he asked.
"Pardon?"
"Curriculode.
Schools for the childers 'n teachit."
"All
of them," the intruder replied, though in the face of more such remarks,
he soon retreated.
Unwin
had his mother - and Edward Lear - to thank for his gift. She had once returned
home injured, and reported to her son that she had just "falolloped
over" in the street - an amalgam of falled and flopped - and
"grozed" her knee.
At
first, Unwin used the same technique merely to amuse his BBC colleagues. Then,
the radio producers Peter Cairns and David Martin persuaded him to meet the
scriptwriter Ted Kavanagh, who wrote material for Tommy Handley, and see if he
could make him laugh. Kavanagh thought Unwin "a minor comic genius".
The
resultant publicity led to Unwin being offered a spot at the Windmill Theatre,
Soho. He declined but, in 1949, made his professional debut with a spoof sports
commentary for BBC Midlands. "He talks gobbledygook without script or
rehearsal," wrote one critic. "But it is so cleverly done that it is
hard to realise it is gibberish."
Unwin
became Uncle Stan on the radio programme Children's Hour and did what he called
"short bursts" on other broadcasts, as well as public dinners and
variety shows. Recognising that his talent was best in small doses, he appeared
briefly in many comedy films, including Carry On Regardless (1961), and as the
Chancellor in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968).
Later,
he had his own television show, Unwin Time, and guested for other entertainers,
including Bernard Braden, David Nixon, Jimmy Tarbuck and Ted Ray, who first
described him as "The Professor". In 1967, he conducted a hilarious
interview with Alan Abel, the American who had written the book, Yours For Decency,
prompting a spoof organisation called the Society for Indecency to Naked
Animals, which believed that all animals should wear clothes. Only Abel - the
hoaxer - remained unaware that his leg was being pulled.
Unwin
wrote a number of books, including Rockabye Babel, The Miscellanian Manuscript
and House And Garbage. He made several records - narrating the tale of
Happiness Stan on the Small Faces' Ogden's Nut Gone Flake album in 1967 - and
was still doing radio work, commercial voice-overs and conference entertainment
into his 80s. With more time, he enjoyed listening to his favourite composers,
"Beetehovey" and "Mozarkers", and he liked the occasional
western starring "Clinty Eastwold, who goes trotty, trotty".
He
remained a straight-forward, good-natured man, who lived in the same house near
Northampton for more than 50 years, adored by his wife Frances, who died in
1993, and his son and two daughters.
· Stanley Unwin, comedian, born June 7 1911; died January 12 2002
Stanley
Unwin
(Filed: 15/01/2002)
STANLEY UNWIN, who has died aged 90, was a comedian and writer who made his name talking nonsense; unlike most who constructed such careers, however, "Professor" Unwin's utterances were constructed intentionally, and destructed to their illogical conclusion.
His historical forebear was Mrs Malaprop, the character in Sheridan's Rivals much given to mangling her words. Unwin traced his descent (through the Reverend W A Spooner) from his mother's propensity to create similar havoc with the English language.
"I falolloped over" - Mrs Unwin's explanation of an injury to her knee - became a cornerstone of the Unwin philology.
Unwin's addiction to this private language, and his extraordinary facility in it, was developed by reading bedtime stories to his own children. A typical beginning - "Once apollytito and Goldiloppers set out in the deep dark of the forry. She carry a basket with buttery-flabe and cheese flavour.
Goldiloppers falolloped over and grazedy kneecap" - proved more riveting than the set scenario. Armed with the approbation of his children, he began to incorporate Unwinisms into his everyday speech, and developed a career in light entertainment.
Stanley Unwin was born on June 7 1911, in Pretoria, South Africa. He joined the merchant navy as a radio operator but, despite his obvious aptitude for the job, had to leave because of his propensity towards sea-sickness.
Unwin then signed up with Plessey Communications Systems as an electronics engineer, before taking on the same job at the BBC's Daventry transmitter. In 1940, he transferred to work on the war reporting unit.
After the war, Unwin was given the opportunity to deliver messages in his private language on the Light Programme; they led to his being signed up to deliver Unwinese pronouncements on Trebor Mints, Gale's Honey and Flower's Ale in advertisements.
Thus launched, Unwin made regular appearances on wireless and television programmes such as Gobbledegook, Unwin Time, Late Night Line-Up and Lunch Box. His quick-fire responses to questions soon won over audiences.
"What is the use of atoms?" might receive the reply "Deeply fully enters here and the calculodes of the incubus soon send the pi-R-squared up the polly, which is enough in all condescience to make the useful ploy in the atomole. . . " and so on.
It was a limited joke, but one which worked well on chat and game shows, often alongside such performers as Ken Dodd or Richard Stilgoe. He narrated the Small Faces' record Ogden's Nut Gone Flake (1968) and in the same year took the Chancellor's role in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Unwin produced a number of books, including Rock-a-Bye-Babel and Two Fairly Tales and House and Garbidge.
He answered the telephone with the greeting "Who calls?" Acquaintances were met with "Deep Joy".
He is survived by his son and two daughters.
I was also sad about Stanley Unwin too. As many of you
know, I sang many backing vocals on the classic album "Ogden's Nut Gone
Flake". It was good to meet up with Stanley again at the Small Faces
convention in 2000. It brought back lots of happy memories.Thanks to Gill
Hellier for the photo. That's all for now
Best wishes
Billy
[click to view full size]
"Once
a polly tie tode, when our young worle was fresh in univerbs and Englande its beauty
garden, a young lad set out in the early mordee, to find it deef wisdom and
true love in flower petals arrayed......."
Thus spoke the guru as Wubble-U sat in reverential silence.
There was only a glimpse of daylight from inside Professor Unwin's shed. Dai,
Deptford, Darkman and Cinders had completely forgotten the blinding spring day
outside and their hydroponic allotment in New Cross, SE 14. It was as if time
and space had been frozen by the tinkly magic of the Guru's voice. Little did
they know that this curious event would lead Wubble-U to the true meaning of
love, life & the joys of an english summer - as in "Petal", their
blindingly superb single available on GO!Discs. "Thats the last bleedin'
time we borrow bamboo cane from any old fridge freezer," remarked
Deptford, "'E's really lost the farkin' plot mate."
Britain is a country bored of its own
language. While johnny foreigner marvels at the prose of Shakespeare, Shelley,
Wordsworth, Dickens and Hardy, your average provicial town joy- rider type of
minger would rather reject the mother tongue in favour of Supermarket Sweep (A
nation of shopkeepers, natch) and You've Been Framed (Are peoples lives really
that boring that these video clips are supposed to be funny?) . Before the
Buggles released "Video killed the RadioStar" there were some
phonetically challenged terrorists that believed that the way to keep our
language alive and vibrant is to subvert it. Spike Milligan, Viv Stanstall, Jake
Thackery - the last believers in the power of nonsense, a sad kind of humour
that is only made and understood by the British themselves. And standing like a
collossus above them all (albeit a reluctant one) is the linguistic lobotomist
himself, the self-styled Professor of Unwinese, Stanley Unwin esq.
Unwin, like many of his disciples and
mimics, is a shameless and enthusiastic supporter of the most influencial
medium of the spoken word - Radio. Indeed, the young lad Unwin was to be found
tinkering with the crystals while a radio reporter for the Beeb in the1940s and
50s. Stanley is a true veteran of Radios Golden Age, when the nation tuned in
to the wireless to listen to The Goons, Round the Horne and Steptoe & Son.
It was in this environment that Unwin began to infiltrate the public
consciousness with his inimitable brand of spoken nonsense, the non-language
that is Unwinese.
Developed from the bedtime stories he'd
made up for his kids and a love of Edward Lear, Unwinese is, for all its
linguistic pretentions, a load of bollocks. Stanley is the first to admit it.
Yet like all the best maulings of the english language, there is a coherent
stream of thought running through Stanley's distorted syllables. When Stanley
says, "And they dancey round, all loony loony rotator", you miss it
literally, but you get it descriptively. Stan will tell you that he has more in
common with a jazz musician than any great intellectual - yet, at the age of
83, he has started to use a word processor as a minor concession to the demands
of the modern media industry in which he still works. Once exposed to an
audience used to listening, Unwin became a star of radio shows and commercials,
influencing comedians and comic writers such as Spike Milligan, Peter Cook,
Freddie Starr and Monty Python. It was almost inevitable that the hippies would
try and get in on it.
In that hazy, love-dup mess that was the
Summer of 1967, Stanley was approached by the Small Faces, a band beloved of
mods throughout the ages, sadly. The Faces felt they had a credibility problem;
every band was making concept albums because they'd smoked pot and got it a bit
wrong on bottom lips. This obviously didn't bother them in their Rod Stewart
phase. Anyway, the result was "Ogdens Nut Gone Flake", an album
considered to be their finest hour. A psychedelic masterpiece,
"Ogdens" is the story of Happiness Jack - as told in impeccably
delivered Unwinese by the master himself. Lets face it, the Heads and the
Freaks loved it because it did their heads in. Stanley achieved instant cult
status for life which still amuses him today. It's worth noting that like all
good concept albums, "Ogdens" took a year to make; and like all good
concept albums, it sounds shite unless you've necked some Jack & Jills.
So what happened next? well, Stan
appeared on numerous TV commercials; a natural performer, he looks great on
telly (he guest stars in Wubble-U's video of "Petal"). Happily,
Stanley is unbothered by his fame and is extremely modest about his
achievements. He has worked with mutual admirer Milligan on "The Great
Bong", has been played out by Sasha to a packed club and has done jingles
for Kiss FM. Not bad for a man in his eighties. Wubble-U love the old git.
As Stan would put it, remember in your brain bockle, lad: Wrong starts with a Wubble-U! All joyfold! Goodlee byelode!
*********************************************************
Comedian Stanley Unwin dies
Unwin:
Affectionately known as 'professor'
Comedian Stanley Unwin, who
won fans with his own zany language, has died aged 90.
Professor Unwin, as he was affectionately
known, found fame by twisting words into a nonsense language, which he called Unwinese,
on radio and later TV in the 1940s and 1950s.
He died peacefully on Saturday at the Dantre
Hospital in Daventry, Northamptonshire, his agent said.
Click here to listen to a clip of Stanley
Unwin
Born in Pretoria, South Africa, it was his
mother who unwittingly provided him with the inspiration for his language.
When she tripped up one day, she told her son
that she had "falloloped over and grazed her knee clapper".
Unwin developed his unique language by
reading fairytales to his children.
He began his career as a BBC engineer in
1940, and was soon persuaded to perform his party piece in front of a
microphone.
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Once a polly tie tode, a young lad set out in the early
mordee, to find it deef wisdom and true love in flower petals arrayed
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Example of Unwinese |
His fame grew after he began doing spots on
variety show broadcasts.
One of his biggest fans was the late Tommy
Cooper who once described him as "bleeding barmy".
Unwin was also said to have influenced comedians
such as Spike Milligan, Peter Cook, Freddie Starr and the Monty Python crew.
He also starred in a number of films, with
roles including the Chancellor in hit children's film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
and the landlord in Carry On Regardless.
In 1968 Unwin reached a whole new audience
when he appeared on The Small Faces' 1968 album Ogdens Nut Gone Flake.
He was a late replacement for Milligan, who
was going to appear on the album, but he delivered the story of Happiness Stan
in his own unique style, which earned him cult status among rock fans.
In 1969 he "appeared" as Father
Stanley Unwin in Gerry Anderson's puppet show The Secret Service.
Unlike his previous work on shows like
Thunderbirds and Joe 90, Anderson used a mixture of live-action and puppetry
for The Secret Service.
Unwin would double as the puppet in motion
sequences and would be seen driving a car and walking with a briefcase.
The series was not as popular as some of
Anderson's earlier work and the show was cancelled after 13 episodes.
He also applied his linguistic skills to the
lucrative TV advertising market.
His last appearance on TV was in 1998 as the
voice of Mr Wangle on BBC animated show Rex the Runt.
*****************************
Unwin unwinds
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The Secret Service Star Stanley
Unwin Dies
Updated: January 14th, 2002
Stanley Unwin, one of Britain's best-loved broadcasters and entertainers and
the star of the 1969 Gerry Anderson Supermarionation series The Secret Service,
has died, aged 90. For more than half a century, Unwin entertained radio and
television audiences with his own gobble-de-gook language, 'Unwin-ese', which
substituted similar-sounding nonsense words for regular English to create a
form of gibberish that had its own internal logic. He had the distinction of
being the only performer to voice a Supermarionation puppet character modelled
on himself when, as Father Stanley Unwin in The Secret Service, he took
the starring role as voice artist for the puppet and also appeared as the
character in person for live-action sequences.
Born in Pretoria, South Africa in 1911, Unwin trained at nautical school and
obtained a first class GPO Wireless Operator's certificate. After a spell at
sea as a deck hand, he joined the wireless manufacturing firm Peto Scott in
London, but got the sack for accidentally blowing up his boss. For three years,
he worked at a company that built echo sounding gear, before joining the Plessy
Company at Ilford where he designed and built test gear for the electronics
industry.
In March 1940, he was hired by the BBC as an electronics maintenance engineer
and four years later, he was invited to join the War Reporting Unit at
Portsmouth, where he recorded the D-Day dispatches of the War Corresponents
with the Normandy Landings. In March 1944, he was sent to join the US Third
Army in France and was then posted with the British 8th Army in Italy before
finally covering the Peace Conference in Paris in 1946. Returning home, he took
a mobile recording engineer's job in the Midlands which involved him in a
variety of work including the first Down Your Way programme with Richard
Dimbleby. As an ex-war reporter, Unwin was also selected to cover the 1947
Royal Tour of South Africa.
Over the next few years, he developed a second career as a broadcaster, using
the Unwinese language that he had developed to entertain his children, but he
was reluctant to leave his job as a sound engineer until he was hired to appear
in a TV commercial for beer and found that his salary for the work was equal to
several years' pay in his day job. He made regular radio and television
appearances in programmes such as Saturday Night On The Light, Beyond
Our Ken, Does The Team Think?, Showtime and Early To
Braden, before going on to appear in a number of feature films including Fun
At St Fanny's (1956), Further Up The Creek (1958), Inn For
Trouble (1960), Hair Of The Dog (1961), Carry On Regardless
(1961), Press For Time (1966) and the Eon production of Chitty Chitty
Bang Bang (1968).
It was while he was completing dubbing work on the latter at Pinewood Studios
that he was introduced to Gerry Anderson and invited to become the star of the
final Supermarionation production, The Secret Service. The series was
written and developed specifically to showcase Unwin's talents and featured him
as Father Stanley Unwin, undercover operative for British Intelligence Service
Headquarters Operation Priest (BISHOP). For the series, Unwin wrote all the
Unwinese dialogue himself, translating the scripted dialogue into lines such as
"Ah, yes, writey scribbly in your bookery, all uttery words speed of
your penceload must defeat my eyebold."
Unwin continued to make radio and television appearances over the last thirty
years and regularly provided voice-overs for commercials. He was also in great
demand as an after-dinner speaker. In 2000, he filmed an interview for
Fanderson's forthcoming The Supermarionation Story documentary, but was
forced to cancel an appearance at the club's Century 21 convention when
he was diagnosed with an inoperable aneurism. He died peacefully on Saturday,
January 12th at the Dantre Hospital in Daventry.
******************************
Stanley Unwin: Master of nonsense
"Professor" Stanley Unwin
specialised in an unfathomable verbal style, replete with malapropisms and
poetic gobbledegook.
It brightened the last days of variety
theatre and, through appearances in radio comedies during the 1950s, brought
him cult status during the hippie era of the late 1960s.
Born in June 1911 in Pretoria, South Africa,
Stanley Unwin's career began unexpectedly when his mother tripped up one day,
telling her son she had "falloloped over and grazed her kneeclapper".
Fascinated by the absurdity of this language
and with that of Edward Lear, writer of The Owl and The Pussycat, he developed
his own bizarre vocabulary, Unwinese, with which he delighted his own children.
The opening lines of Goldiloppers, his
version of Goldilocks, gives a flavour of Stanley Unwin's style.
"Once apollytito and Goldiloppers set
out in the deep dark of the forry. She was carry a basket with buttere-flabe
and cheesy flavour."
After serving as a wireless operator in the
Merchant Navy, Stanley Unwin joined the BBC in 1940 as an engineer in the
Corporation's war reporting unit.
His linguistic dexterity impressed his
colleagues, who eventually persuaded him to perform a party piece into a
microphone.
Before long, he had become a variety
performer in the theatre, on radio and on the new medium of television, most
notably alongside the magician David Nixon on Showtime.
On film, he appeared in 1955's Fun at St
Fanny's with a veritable rogues' gallery of comedy: bumbling Peter Butterworth,
stick-like Cardew "The Cad" Robinson, rotund and avuncular Fred Emney
and, the then, juvenile Ronnie Corbett.
As the gloom of post-war austerity
transformed into the Swinging Sixties, Stanley Unwin gained a whole new
audience as a seer/sage of psychedelia.
He featured as the narrator on The Small
Faces' 1968 concept album, Ogden's Nut Gone Flake, excelling on the track
Happiness Stan.
The album, the band's last, remained at the
top of the charts for six weeks.
During the same year he featured as the
Chancellor in the big screen adaptation of Ian Fleming's children's novel,
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Later, he was transformed into a puppet,
Father Stanley Unwin, in Gerry Anderson's short-lived, and truly odd, series
The Secret Service.
Over the years, Stanley Unwin's voice was used for many television advertisements, including a memorable plug for Pirelli tyres, with subtitles being utilised to clarify his message.
More recently, well into his 80s, his jingles
graced the airwaves at Kiss FM.
Stanley Unwin's gentle humour was whimsical
and typically British, bringing "wonderboldness and deep, deep joy"
to fans including Spike Milligan, Ken Dodd and Tommy Cooper.
******************************
Stanley
Unwin: Master of nonsense Professor" Stanley Unwin specialised in an
unfathomable verbal style, replete with malapropisms and poetic gobbledegook.
[Look at it only if you can bear to read the following statement:
"Fascinated by the absurdity of this language and with that of Edward Lear
of Jabberwocky fame, he developed his own bizarre vocabulary, Unwinese, with
which he delighted his own children."]
BBC also has another obituary: Comedian
Stanley Unwin dies, and a page with samples: Stanley Unwin
Thinking of England on BBCi.
posted by Marco
Graziosi 12:35 PM
Obituary:
Stanley Unwin Few variety artistes have caught the public’s imagination
quite like Stanley Unwin, the self-styled “Professor of Unwinese”, a
glottal-stopped gobbledegookian language that sounded deceptively like English
trying to swallow itself. For more than fifty years he gave bewildering
humorous expositions which might almost have come from the pages of Finnegans
Wake.
Unwinese developed out of bedtime stories that he had invented for his
children, together with an admiration he had for the nonsense poet Edward Lear.
The Times
posted by Marco
Graziosi 12:24 PM
******************************
Sorely Misty In The Footy Worldlode....Tribbly To Sir Stanley (Unwin)
good peopley..far
and wide...
in the roundy ball write and rhymey world..
and series in the thoughts now..
for better time... never was than now.
to menshy-menshy the name Sir Stanley.?
and not Matthews in the Stoke shirt of course
all brycreemed down the wingy lode..
but Unwin..jokey..jokey..all nonsey funny but make no sensey
but who carelodes..if tickly throcus and giggly
all chortly in the tummy fold....
but not digressy dangerlode..
and listeny well
all arm-chair teletubs and future athlodes
in the Peopley Game ahead and new...
all teenfold daffy becksters in the man u's
or arsenolds in the viairers...
for long long ago..
back in the ninebold sixties
all time warpy warpy..and hippy daisy-cull in the lovey lovey..
a joyfold and star-studdy footbally kidney
with dream makey in the eyeboles
met Sr Stanley at a public meety night ...
long time..long time..even before Totteny endy
the twenty sevvy game unbeatyfold..
and there...in that pricely momo of questie answery
and still barely a young manifold in the ordinance
surf-spray
he asked Sir Stanley.......
"Do you think Tottenham will wn the cup this year?"
Answerforth Sir Stanley..and this be true..for i found it today..
"Well, erm, actually this is a very good question and topicold.
I would say that if the forward line have a symmetrical teamworkers and that
they can from the first passit of the ball...
take in mind the measured beat of a one, two, throo or fido...
so that the ball can falollop out to the wingers
and a very fine trittly how in a run and drop-kick
and carry one and shooting in the goal
If they can get by without an offsiger
which is known on the ref
and don't throw the bottload
because he's only doing his best.
But, er,
it'll be hard on their halfbackers
because I don't think they'll get a chance to do a falolloper shooty
on account of the front line with their deep joy of
shall we say, an express in their enthusiasm
to the first who to clop falollop in the goalmouth.
Oh yes. Anyway it's a very good question, sir
; it's not much about music
excepting that half-time in the band falolloped huffalo-dowd. "***
(**Actual Extract -Sir Stanley Unwin.)from World Of Yak Website
******************************
JULY - 1996 - AUGUST
‘PROFESSOR’
STANLEY UNWIN
85 not out - presents JARS a centenary
gift with his unique view of jazz history
When Jazz (how or what) came, is the dizziest of a fundamole. Not mark you
of a Gillespeed fundamole, O no. There were no recorms vailabold ‘til 1917;
these by white perslode, The Original Dixieland Jazz Band. Maybe otherwise jazz
handy down by fardles’n mothers ‘til the first recorms in 1923 in a railside
studio ramshackload by a black onsombly; Oliver’s, 1923, with his Creole Jazz
Band, which inclubed Louis Armstrong who strode with first fine second
trumpy-blow. There’s a start of a historical impaggers indeedy-ho!
Early twenty yields the whiters band of Paul Whiteman, but with few jazz
creaturals. These were some bar interjeps from Joe Venuti (catgut’n violin
scrapey-joy, y’know) and Eddie Lang’s guitar pluck’fretfolded; O yes. Mind you,
there were hot solomes done by C Melody saxophobia from Frankie Trumbauer and
Bix gave splendy cornet hot contribule too. O yes.
CHICK WEBBER A DRUMJOY
Contempries with these; big banders black were doing the jazz-play: Duke
Ellingtones, Chick Webber of drumjoy, Charlie Johnson, Fletcher Henderstones,
all of whom preceded Count Basics and Jimmy Luncefolder; all of this because
peeplodes had a thaucus blacks could play this wild musicolly. But Whiters?
Ahem.
There were recorms jazz-pure by Hot Fido and Several of Louis Armstrong. These
with Jelly Roller of Morty fame are collector’s classicool. Indeedy ho.
BEIDERWHILE
But what of smaller groupers gathery? Beiderwhile with Bixie-Gang and Frankie Tram C mellow saxifolder, then of course with Jean Goldkettle aboil before the Whitemold joinit. Next came hot interspurps with Casa’n Loma, leading to the Swing era of belly Goodmold, Dorsey’n Dorsey and Krupa drumset’n symbold. At the same toil there were white musicools like Eddie Condon of guitar’n pluck-it banjold and Bob Crosby’s band. Later came-it the Dixieland Musee preservale from Muggsy Spanier’s Ragtoil, leady-hup to a revivy-merge of obscury blacks from limbold quite suddly. George Lewis clarinebbers, trumplode of Bunk Johnson, Hunkydory trombslider, Big Bill Broonzy-bluesing and a fine leadermuxlewis of boog-it’n woog-it. Hey.
BE-POP PHENOMINAKERS
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