Talk:Private Eye

The Private Eye Story

Updated according to lots of into from The Private Eye Story. This book is around 20 years old now but I was careful not to include any info which is clearly out of date. Keir 20:42, 30 Nov 2003 (UTC)~

Uganda

I don't know if anyone wants to do anything with this, but "Ugandan relations" was originally "talking about Uganda": one female Ugandan diplomat's explanation some time in the mid-1970s of what she was doing with a man in an airplane lavatory. And, speaking of potentially confusing inside jokes, what about "Baillie Vass" for Lord Home (or is that too long ago to matter)? In any case, it might be worth adding a list of Private Eye's names for the various UK papers. "The Grauniad" has passed into the language, I suppose, but the "Daily Getsworse" deserves a gloss. It seems to me that this article could include (or be supplemented by) a useful reference for those trying to decipher Private Eye without reading it regularly. I don't sound too much like a retired military officer writing to The Times, but I don't want to wade into editing this particular article. -- Jmabel 08:16, 9 Dec 2003 (UTC)

About Criticism

There is a quote in the Criticism section: "And first they visited upon the city of Jen-in in a terribel plague of fire and brimstone, so that many of the Araf-ites and Hamas-ites were slain, even men, women and children". I don't know if the "terribel" typo is intentional, if so perhaps it should be marked if so (with "[sic]" or something).

Well spotted. My typo. Fixed. –Hajor

I've never seen anything anti-semetic in the Eye or anything which could be construed that way - as far as I can tell they make fun of anyone and everyone. OK, there's the KJV thing, but it's making fun of the whole Middle Eastern thing, not a particular religion. If Private Eye was anti-semitic I wouldn't read it, and it isn't, it's just funny.

Also, maybe I've missed it but shouldn't this article have something about Pseuds Corner and the way the magazine prints all the misprints and "boobs" and stuff in the papers (I've actually got a book of these - i know, i know...) XYaAsehShalomX 20:12, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Pseuds Corner is already mentioned. Stephenb (Talk) 10:40, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Baillie Vass

The reference to Sir Alec Douglas Home arose from a wrongly captioned photograph in a Scotch local paper. A Baillie is a minor official and one such, Mr Vass, was in the news. Unfortunately his caption appeared under the picture of Sir Alec.

Sindie

I maybe wrong but doesn't Sindie refer to the Independent on Sunday, not the Independent itself. I presume it is also a play on the Sindy doll. Secretlondon 00:10, 15 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You're right, I've fixed it. -- Avaragado 09:53, 15 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Page 94

Can anyone explain why 94 in particular was chosen as an arbitrary large number in practically every issue of the magazine? Is there a story behind it? -Sewing - talk 20:08, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Explaining every joke in sufficient detail to kill it utterly

There must be a better way to do this, including all the tediously detailed explanations to the last dot of every single joke. Just removing said explanations makes this a much better-written article. Just because someone put them in doesn't obligate us to perpetuate them - David Gerard 16:59, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Polly Filler

I notice that from the newspaper parodies section, Polly Filler is missing. I added it, but don't really know how to describe it, so left it blank for someone who reads the paper more often.

Does anyone know the real-life original of PF? (or at least some of the originals this section draws on?)

I suggest you read Alison Pearson. Only once, mind you

Nit-Picking, Really

Likewise, I can't see 'The Curse of Gnome' listed. I'll leave someone with better words than me to add it.

Andrew Neil

I'd always been under the impression that the "anonymous asian female" in those photos was none other than Ms Dynamite, the RnB performer. Can anybody substantiate this?

I'm pretty sure that this is wrong: "The Eye frequently refers to Neil as "Neill", inspired by the unusual spelling of Pamella Bordes' name."

I have read (must find source) that the Eye spells his name wrongly because it annoys him. --Cunningham 17:39, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Sex!

I've been reading the magazine since the late seventies, on and off. The article suggests that the magazine has always had a diffident attitude towards revealing extramarital affairs. My (probably exaggerated) recollection of the Ingrams era was that half the "news" section was filled with startling revelations about the deputy manager of Borsetshire council highway maintenance department shagging his secretary, or some minor civil servant's brother-in-law being a "poove". A lot of the journalists left when Hislop was appointed editor, and took those attitudes with them - I seem to remember Hislop saying at the time that shagging was no longer news unless there was an extra dimension, and the Great Homosexual Conspiracy was now a dead issue (Simon Regan had a real bee in his bonnet about that). I don't have any sources for any of this, but it's worth digging out. The magazine was occasionally quite uncomfortable reading for a Thatcher-era leftie teenager. --Andrew Norman 13:07, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Porn link spam

I've removed many links to a pron link that clogged up the top of the page. Begone, spammer of porn!

Idi Amin, and privacy

Ugandan Discussions did, indeed, become part of the language for more than two decades, but it's still not clear that the woman concerned was not telling the truth.

The background to the incident in the plane was the dictator, Idi Amin. He ruthlessly executed, tortured or simply imprisoned all who showed opposition to his rule, and anybody who was in any way critical of him was likely to receive the same treatment. Even occasional attempts at flattery could be mis-interpreted as insurrection, with cruel punishment the result.

So it is perfectly feasible that if someone (the woman was, I believe, a suspected dissident) wanted to discuss his rule in an airplane, they would seek more privacy than you can find in the public seating area. That doesn't mean they were not having sex! - but it does mean that she would have seen the excuse as plausible, not risible.

I discovered this entry while trying to find out where Ugandan Internet cafes are located - specifically, http://www.newswireless.net/index.cfm/article/2308 wireless hotspots.

Intriguingly, I had no success. Amin, it may be remembered, purged Uganda of all its Asian citizens at the time, and most of them came to Britain. A great many Internet Cafes, in the UK, are owned by ethnic Asians... coincidence?

--Guy Kewney 10:33, 05 Jul 2005

The story I remember involved a British journalist and an African diplomat at a party in London, not on an aircraft. As described in the article, in fact. If I recall correctly the diplomat was not himself Ugandan, and had a reputation for inviting attractive young journalists to discuss African politics with him in private. There's an alternative explanation I found on the web about Idi Amin accusing one of his ministers of having had illicit sex in a cupboard, but it doesn't seem plausible to me. --Andrew Norman 5 July 2005 11:47 (UTC)

A post to alt.usage.english a few years back provides more context: [1]; this roughly coincides with the story as I recall it. I vaguely recall a gloss mentioned by the Eye once, which was the "incident at party" explanation. Shimgray 5 July 2005 14:06 (UTC)

Glenda Slagg

For some reason I thought Glenda Slagg was based on (the now defunct) Lynda Lee-Potter - correct me if I'm wrong.

I would'nt be surprised if it was based on Lynda-Lee Potter - the similarities are uncanny.

Have I Got News For You

Should this be linked somewhere? Maybe it's just the Hislop thing, but I always get the idea it's (or was) an on-screen continuation of Private Eye.