OZZOBOOKO Australian Place Names Revisited

Ridley, Bruce and Brian

ISBN 10: 0947236007 / ISBN 13: 9780947236007

Published by Inca Books, Western Australia, 1988

About this Item

Crease to back cover bottom corner; Narrow width , play with words and names. 280gms weight; 4to 11" - 13" tall; 112 pages.

Seller Inventory # 20831

Bibliographic Details

• Title: OZZOBOOKO Australian Place Names Revisited
• Publisher: Inca Books, Western Australia
• Publication Date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0947236007
• ISBN 13: 9780947236007
• Binding: Paperback
• Illustrator: Illustrated by Johnston, Cherry
• Condition: Very Good
• Seller catalogs:
  • Australian Wit and Humour
  • Language

About this title

Synopsis

At a rough estimate* there are 600,000 words in the English language. This is good news for scrabble players, but it is still not enough.In our day-to-day existence there are still countless objects, situations, qualities and experiences which we are all familiar with but do not have names. What, for example, do you call those party whistle things that uncurls and makes a funny noise when you blow into the mouthpiece and then returns to its original shape when you stop blowing? If only we had an accurate word to denote this festive appliance we wouldn't have to go into clumsy, long winded explanations like the one just given. And there are scores of other examples, as the contents of this long-awaited volume will reveal. There is no question, then that our vocabulary is sorely deficient. Words are failing us.

At the same time Australia is rich, not only in mineral resources and skin cancer, but also in weird and wonderful place names that are just curious or as evocative as any to be found overseas. The trouble is that many of these place names, and especially those designating small country towns or remote stations, hardly ever see the light of day. Occasionally they can be seen on the front of envelopes or on the odd signpost in the middle of nowhere, but for the most part they are condemned to obscurity, unknown except to a handful of locals and passing crows.

What better, then, than to bring our colourful place names out into the open, and at the same time to christen all those everyday objects, situations etc. that up till now have remained nameless? This, in essence, is what Ozzobooko is about. At long last marvellous place names like Mukinbudin and Wamenusking and Koolyanobbing have stopped being mere dots on a small scale mapped are performing a useful function. At long last Ingleburn Milpo has come into its own.

*Last time we counted there were exactly 612, 873