Sinister: Weren't we

[Julie_Smith at xxx.com]

talking about mondegreens  a while back? I discovered this explanation on the 
web . .  .

The term "mondegreen" was invented by the
writer Sylvia Wright in 1954, and for an explanation of the circumstances,
we turn to Mr. Mondegreen himself, columnist Jon Carroll of the San
 Francisco Chronicle, who has made it his personal crusade to popularize
the care and feeding of mondegreens: 

"As a child [Sylvia Wright] had heard the Scottish ballad ''The Bonny Earl
of Murray" and had believed that one stanza went like this: Ye Highlands
and Ye Lowlands, Oh where hae you been?, They hae slay the Earl of
Murray, And Lady Mondegreen. 

"Poor Lady Mondegreen, thought Sylvia Wright. A tragic heroine dying with her 
liege; how poetic. When it turned out, some
years later, that what they had actually done was slay the Earl of Murray and 
lay him on the green, Wright was so distraught
by the sudden disappearance of her heroine that she memorialized her with a 
neologism." 

If you all, like me are curious about the origins of words and phrases, you 
should definitely check out this site.

http://www.word-detective.com/backidx.html

I guess this isn't exactly B & S content, but then, they seem to be talented 
wordsmiths to say the least.

Julie
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