Thursday 31 October 2019

you need to write out a thousand times, ‘i will behave myself at prime minister’s questions’

Among the cadre of some fifty members who are stepping down or will not seek reelection in the December general election, John Bercow's departure (previously) as Speaker of the House of Commons will perhaps be the most conspicuous absence.
Marshaling order and discipline in an unruly and contentious chamber, Bercow's signature cry was buffeted by a vocal and vociferous vocabulary that he did hesitate to unleash on his collegues. Analysing parliamentary transcripts that span over a century then drilling down to his own decade-long tenure produces a profile of frequency in rarity and turn of phrase—including for the nonce susurration for the calming sound of whispers and murmurs, perhaps just ones indoors voice, Demosthenian for aspiring to the rhetorical skill of the Athenian orator and statesman to his far more recurrent chuntering, speaking of the grunts and murmurs of the assembled.