Bulls and Howlers
Bulls, Blunders, and Howlers was published in 1928 by Brentano's Ltd.
Walter Jerrold (1865-1929), who edited the book, describes Bulls, Blunders, and Howlers, in the book's Preface, as follows:
"all that has been attempted is the presentation in a roughly classified arrangement of a gradually accumulated collection of ... jests — including the 'bull' of the traditional Irishman and the 'howler' of the child now at school — as may be regarded as coming under the heading of blunders. Totalling as they do upwards of thirteen hundred, they represent all sorts of those blunderings in words and ideas which many people find more mirth-provoking than they do the subtleties of wit".
We have reproduced just a small sample of those 1300 specimens, under the following headings:School Yarns and Howlers
Published in 1934, School Yarns and Howlers contains a number of fresh bulls and howlers. In the book's introduction, Will Hay explains the humour of innocent childhood misunderstandings:
The appeal of the Howler lies, in my opinion, in our sympathetic understanding of the weary little brain making a desperate effort to get to the right answer, only to end up by correlating a lot of facts not related to each other, but each having a hazy bearing on the subject of the question.
School Yarns and Howlers became so popular that the book was reprinted 14 times. In just one day, customers ordered more than 7,800 copies.
Follow the this link for a selection of howlers from the book:
Bloomers
"Bloomers" seems to be chiefly an Australian slang term, meaning "a mistake". The term "bloomer" is abbreviated from "a blooming error" (Oxford English Dictionary). John Audrey compiled a collection of bloomers published in Australia in 1937 by Angus and Robertson, called simply, Bloomers. In his "Warning to Readers", John Audrey says "It is compiled without malice aforethought, but with strict adherence to truth, and it can be charged fairly with aiding and abetting laughter". Click the following link for selected quotes from Audrey's compilation:
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