I’ve decided to do something a bit different. In this, I read a selection from Polly Jean Harvey’s narrative poem, Orlam. The book offers a rather bilingual version of the poem, in both standard English and the Dorset dialect whence hails Ms Harvey.
The piece I’ve selected is titled Overwehelem. I’m going to recite the Dorset rendition.
Voul village in a hag-ridden hollow. All ways to it winding, all roads to it narrow. Auverlooked bog, veiled in vog, thirtover, undercreepen, rank with seepings; Jeyes Fluid, slurry, zweat and pus, anus greaze, squitters, jizz and blood Breeder of asthma, common warts, ringworm. Ward of ancient occupations; ploughshares rusting in the brembles, half-walls, smuggler's runs and ditches, blackened heth stones, lured lullabies; Mummy's going to smack you if you don't . . . The crossroads a red hanging-post to GOAT HILL, RANSHAM, OVERWELEM. Three hoar-stones, one Golden Fleece connected by a single Riddle. Gramf'er blackthorn bent by wind. Shabby mothers trying to die. A haunted wood in the realm of an Eye. A farm of hooks with a rout of Rawles. a mother of sorrow, a faterous fiend, a runstick son and his inward friend, and a not-gurrel born amongst them: fouling her fig in the forest, honking a conk-load of creosote, downing a dram of diazinon, flaying a fleece-full of maggots, gorging a gutful of entrails, scrounching the scabs o' engripement, hoarding the horrible heissens, bearing the burden of wordle.
So there you have it. Overwhelem from PJ Harvey’s Orlam.
As I mentioned, the book presents the English side-to-side with the Dorset. As Dorset in the south of Britain is an English dialect, most of the words and form should be familiar. There are a few that are less obvious than others. If you’d like a translation, pick up the book or ask in the comments.
