International Talk Like a Pirate Day

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International Talk Like a Pirate Day
200px
Type Parodic
Date September 19
Next time September 19, 2024 (2024-09-19)
Frequency annual

International Talk Like a Pirate Day (ITLAPD, September 19) is a parodic holiday created in 1995 by John Baur (Ol' Chumbucket) and Mark Summers (Cap'n Slappy), of Albany, Oregon,[1] U.S., who proclaimed September 19 each year as the day when everyone in the world should talk like a pirate.[2] For example, an observer of this holiday would greet friends not with "Hello," but with "Ahoy, matey!" The holiday, and its observance, springs from a romanticized view of the Golden Age of Piracy.

History

"Cap'n Slappy" and "Ol' Chumbucket", the founders of Talk Like a Pirate Day

According to Summers, the day is the only known holiday to come into being as a result of a sports injury. During a racquetball game between Summers and Baur, one of them reacted to the pain with an outburst of "Aaarrr!", and the idea was born. That game took place on June 6, 1995, but out of respect for the observance of the Normandy landings, they chose Summers' ex-wife's birthday, as it would be easy for him to remember.[1][3]

At first an inside joke between two friends, the holiday gained exposure when John Baur and Mark Summers sent a letter about their invented holiday to the American syndicated humor columnist Dave Barry in 2002.[4] Barry liked the idea and promoted the day.[4] Growing media coverage of the holiday after Barry's column has ensured that this event is now celebrated internationally, and Baur and Summers now sell books and T-shirts on their website related to the theme. Part of the success for the international spread of the holiday has been attributed to non-restriction of the idea or non-trademarking, in effect opening the holiday to creativity and "viral" growth.[5]

The association of pirates with peg legs, parrots, and treasure maps, popularized in Robert Louis Stevenson's novel Treasure Island (1883), has had a significant influence on parody pirate culture.[6] Talk Like a Pirate Day is celebrated with hidden easter egg features in many games and websites,[7] with Facebook introducing a pirate-translated version of its website on Talk Like a Pirate Day 2008[8] and publisher O'Reilly discounting books on the R programming language to celebrate.[9] Minecraft also features this language (en_PT) since January 5, 2012.[citation needed] In September 2014, Reddit added a pirate theme to their website.[10]

Linguistic background

English actor Robert Newton, who specialized in portraying pirates, especially Long John Silver in the 1950 Disney film Treasure Island and the 1954 Australian film Long John Silver and the title character in the 1952 film Blackbeard the Pirate,[11] is described as the "patron saint" of Talk Like a Pirate Day.[1] Newton was born in Dorset and educated in Cornwall, and it was his native West Country dialect, which he used in his portrayal of Long John Silver and Blackbeard, that some contend is the origin of the standard "pirate accent".[12] This was parodied in the 1950s and 1960s by British comedian Tony Hancock.[13]

The archetypal pirate grunt "Arrr!" (alternatively "Rrrr!" or "Yarrr!") first appeared in fiction as early as 1934 in the film Treasure Island starring Lionel Barrymore,[13] and was used by a character in the 1940 novel Adam Penfeather, Buccaneer by Jeffrey Farnol.[13] However it was popularized and widely remembered with Robert Newton's usage in the classic 1950 Disney film Treasure Island. It has been speculated that the rolling "rrr", a distinctive element of the speech of the West Country of England, has been associated with pirates because of the West Country's strong maritime heritage, with for many centuries fishing the main industry (and smuggling a major unofficial one), and where there were several major ports. As a result, West Country speech in general, and Cornish speech in particular, may have been a major influence on a generalized British nautical speech.[14][15]

Official acknowledgment

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ The Original Talk Like A Pirate Day Web site, by John Baur and Mark Summers.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Dave Barry, "Arrrrr! Talk like a pirate—or prepare to be 'boarded'". September 8, 2002.
  5. ↑ Interview with the Founders, Andrew Warner, Sept. 19. 2008.
  6. ↑ David Cordingly (1995). Under the Black Flag: The Romance and Reality of Life Among the Pirates. ISBN 0-679-42560-8
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Dan Parry (2006). "Blackbeard: The Real Pirate of the Caribbean". p. 174. National Maritime Museum
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ "R!?". Language log, September 19, 2005.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  18. ↑ Long John Silver's Talk Like a Pirate Day promotion September 5, 2012
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Henderson, Bobby. The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. 2006. ISBN 0-8129-7656-8, p.124.

Further reading

External links

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