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Effles and Fluffles

A list of 40 words by sionnach.

About

I'm splitting these off, to avoid adulteration of the Eggcorn list.

Effle is grammatical English which could never be uttered because it has little meaning and could never be put into a sensible context. There is lots of Effle in textbooks of English for foreign learners and in sets of exercises.

The playwright Eugene Ionesco wrote a complete play in Effle, The Bald Prima Donna, the product of his experience of learning English from a textbook in 1950.

I'm revising the scope of this list to include the equivalent of Effles in other languages as well (let's call them Fluffles). One of the best-known is, of course, the infamous phrase "My hovercraft is full of eels", courtesy of Monty Python.

Comments

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  • Prolagus commented on the list effles-and-fluffles

    Are you sure that the last one belongs here? (Based on your list description)

    December 26, 2008

  • Prolagus commented on the list effles-and-fluffles

    I still don't get the meaning of this list :(

    January 2, 2009

  • sarra commented on the list effles-and-fluffles

    Where are you getting these (I'm thinking of the non-English ones) from?

    January 3, 2009

  • sionnach commented on the list effles-and-fluffles

    sarra: See recent comment on my profile.

    January 3, 2009

  • sarra commented on the list effles-and-fluffles

    You beat me, I just found it!

    January 3, 2009

  • ruzuzu commented on the list effles-and-fluffles

    How did I miss this? Also, have you seen the pen of my aunt? I've been searching for days and days.

    January 15, 2013