The Queen’s English

As I sat on the subway yesterday evening, the woman asking me which stop took her to Soho had a definite accent -- a little Mick Jagger, a little Merchant-Ivory -- and I asked if she were from England (as opposed to Australia or South Africa). Turns out she was from Yorkshire, where the movie, “The Full Monty,” as well as the children’s book/movie, “The Secret Garden” take place. I told her I was about to go see “The Queen,” and she said over the years she’d seen the Queen several times herself. I said that I really just meant the movie, “The Queen” – we laughed and then joked about how funny it would be to see Her Royal Highness sitting and signing autographs in the lobby of the Angelika Theater.

Now cut back to London, 1997, “The Queen’s” starting point, when newly elected Prime Minister Tony Blair is about to meet Queen Elizabeth. On the way up Buckingham Palace’s winding stairs, a staff person spouts off the protocol for being In Presence (that’s what it’s called when you’re with the Queen); and when the man tells Tony to call the queen “ma’am,” he emphasizes: “’ma’am’ that rhymes with ‘ham,’ and not ‘mahm’ that rhymes with ‘fahm’” (or farm). Apparently, minding his P’s and Q’s was not enough – the P.M. had to watch his “A’s” as well!

But that was just the kind of thing I wanted to hear: I had headed off to see this movie last night not only because I’d read the good reviews and usually enjoy period and historical movies -- and actually remember something of the time portrayed (the week after Princess Diana’s death); but an even more compelling reason to go was that I wanted to listen to the English accents. Specifically, I wanted to hear any evidence of a type of “down market” pronunciation that has reportedly been seeping into the speech habits of upper class English people for the past 20 or so years. (Confusing the “a” in “ham” or “farm” is not part of that phenomenon though -- maybe it just grates on the Queen’s nerves.)

Called Estuary English after the Thames estuary region in London and southeast England where this variety of English began, it was documented in 1984 by linguist David Rosemarne and his been the subject of much interest and debate ever since. My own research into this topic was inspired by a comment sent in by Icedink (see Language Lady, "Myself Misuse," 9/24/06). These particular pronunciation variations, found increasingly in and around London are partly adapted from Cockney and supposedly add a dash of working class/I’m-one-with-the-people sort of cache – the kind of thing that aristocrats might do to sound cool, or maybe just less remote, and politicians might do to better fit in with their constituents.

Still, the Queen’s problem in the movie was that she did not connect with her people through public displays of emotion, much less any subtle speech affectations to sound like them; in fact, trying to effect a more common accent would have been the last thing on the mind of Helen Mirren’s Queen Elizabeth (and probably on the real one’s too). As for Michael Sheen’s Tony Blair, who definitely wanted to connect with the people -- and succeeded -- he nonetheless seemed to stick to his Oxford-honed English as he delivered his speeches to the mourning masses. And his upper class accent also supported him in his oh-so carefully chosen words each time he tried to persuade the Queen to leave Balmoral and come to London.

Yet my grand mission of detecting the down-market sounds of Estuary (pronounced "estree" according to Icedink) English in those upper class protagonists was ultimately flawed from the get-go: the attempt failed to take into account that I really don’t have any trained ear for the subtleties I was listening for. Okay, I listen to British-narrated books on tape. But other than that, I’m an American surrounded by Americans. What was I thinking?

If The Queen or the Prime Minister were Estuary English-dropping any t’s (making “butter” sound like “buh-err”) or turning “l’s” into “w’s,” (making “milk” sound like “mewk” and “will you” sound like “w-i-w you”), I didn’t catch them. Except I did think I once heard Tony say, “peo-puw” instead of “peo-pul” (people) – but I also kept forgetting to listen while I got caught up in the show.

However, if you plan to see the movie, perhaps you can do a better job than I did, and then let me know – especially re Tony and his staff. Also Cherie Blair, Tony’s wife, was portrayed as a strong anti-monarchist – did she use Estuary English at all? Again, I forgot to listen.

Still, I did notice other things, like:

Wow! Helen Mirren really captured The Queen as I imagine her. I remember hearing The Real Queen give her belated Princess Diana condolence speech – and remember now how high her voice sounded, and that I hadn’t expected it to sound that way. It was like her words were going through a sieve, morphing into shrill little bubbles en route from her mouth to the air. Helen Mirren captured that sound – which I think was probably due to nerves, because otherwise in the movie, the Queen didn’t sound so tinny. (Overly proper, stiff, etc. – but not tinny.)

The other thing that I remembered about seeing The Real Queen give that condolence speech was that she looked JUST LIKE our former housekeeper, Dorothy, who lived with us almost forever. Dorothy had the exact same hair-do as the Queen, the same pale complexion, full cheeks, and short stature. As I stared at the TV that day, I had a Separated At Birth moment, where it looked like Dorothy, not the Queen, was addressing the world. But how different Dorothy seemed with that accent! And how different the Queen would have seemed if she had spoken like a woman who grew up in McHenry, Illinois!

Which brings up the next Posting:
Do accents make people or vice-versa?
Think about it: whose accent would you want to have? Would that change you? Stayed tuned.