Biggles

We were talking in the pub at the weekend about the success of Harry Potter and Ivan wanted to know why no one read Biggles books any more. Maybe it's the loss of empire, changing attitudes to our European neighbours, etc but i think it's the lack of good swearing in them.

You see during the war swearing was rationed and only certain low-impact cuss words were allowed "oh sugar" i hear you say "that's a bit of a shakey-do" and you'd be right! Right up to 1957 the word "bollocks" would cost you a weeks worth of swearing coupons. The stronger exclamations could often only be uttered by societies who had pooled their vouchers and would take turns to pronounce a syllable whilst marching in tight formation. The best of these was known as The Blue Arrows they would perform swearing displays at local pageants and country fairs. The general public tired of standing in swearing queues (some younger children didn't even know what "bugger" sounded like until four years after the war) ate it up but the gradual increase in imported swearwords from America, under the Arsehole plan, led to a decline in interest.

This makes the books too tame for modern tastes so gorblimey guvnor they're not gonna come back into flippin' fashion. Lumme what a swiz!