Rare Book Monthly
Book Catalogue Reviews - December - 2008 Issue
Antiquarian Books and Ephemera from Samuel Gedge Rare Books
Pedro Carolino's guide became one of the classics of unintended humor.
Item 26 was the precursor to all those product manuals written in "English" you receive with goods manufactured in Asia, manuals written by people who obviously have little familiarity with the English language. This is The New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and English, with the unlikely claimed imprint of Peking, published in 1869. It became famous in its time for its unintended humor. The fractured English was so amusing to English audiences that the American edition came with a preface from no less than Mark Twain. Twain describes its author, Pedro Carolino, as "an honest and upright idiot." Carolino was evidently translating a French-Portuguese phrasebook to English-Portuguese while possessing very limited knowledge of the English language. Twain goes on to quote several gems from the book that became commonly known as "English As She Is Spoke," including the following: "Tough he is German, he speak so much well italyan, french, spanish and english, that among the Italyans, they believe him Italyan, he speak the frenche as the Frenches himselves. The Spanishesmen believe him Spanishing, and the Englishes, Englishman. It is difficult to enjoy well so much several languages." £400 (US $$601).
Samuel Gedge Ltd. Rare Books may be reached at +44 (0)1263 722 555 or rarebooks@samuelgedge.com. Their website is www.samuelgedge.com.
