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Diary

Barry Humphries’s diary: My war with ‘Wow!’

Plus: The posthumous wit of Oscar Wilde and the curious poignancy of Murder, She Wrote

29 October 2015

9:00 AM

29 October 2015

9:00 AM

I’m counting ‘Wows!’ Suddenly everyone is using this irritating expletive expressing incredulity, amazement and nothing at all. I’ve heard it from the lips of daughters in law, professors of literature, rabbis and housewives. No doubt at least one priest has said it after a particularly lurid confession. It is spreading like leprosy over ordinary discourse and will, in time, die out like ‘Zounds’ or ‘Gee whizz’.

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Barry Humphries is the creator of Sir Les Patterson and Dame Edna Everage.

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