I knew Rushdie was fishy, but…

Fishmonger chain Wright Brothers has commissioned a poll to find out how much its customers know about its product.

The results yet again emphasise the superlative quality of British education. For example, about a third of respondents think that Salman Rushdie is a fish dish, presumably served with chips. (That means, among other things, that they can’t spell ‘salmon’.)

Nearly 20 per cent think prawn cocktail is an alcoholic drink. And 30 per cent think sushi is a fish, though different from Salman Rushdie.

Some 20 per cent refuse to wade through British waters for fear of encountering great white sharks. Those fish are indeed scary but, since they prefer sunnier climes, Britons have more to fear from their own government.

Half of respondents don’t know that mullet is a fish, not just a hairstyle. To my shame, I find myself in the other half, those who know the former but not the latter. About the same proportion are unaware that dogfish actually exists (though fishdog doesn’t) and that fish have noses.

Still, perhaps I was too rash in accusing our huddled masses of ignorance. After all, fish has nothing to do with either first causes or last things. Perhaps, the same people who claim to have tucked into their Salman can’t be bothered about such trivialities.

Perhaps, just perhaps, they skip ichthyology to bury themselves in such seminal subjects as theology, philosophy, counterpoint… No, scratch that thought. I’m sure those same respondents have no clue what theology and philosophy are, and they probably think counterpoint is a knitting technique.

While we are on the subject of pathetic ignorance, I can’t help noticing the abundance of malapropisms in our football commentary, both oral and written.

And please don’t tell me that mocking footballers for their English is hardly sporting. I know that. It’s just that, as a lifelong student (and occasional teacher) of English, I can’t help myself. It’s some kind of Pavlovian reflex.

Thus, Rio Ferdinand, ex-footballer turned commentator, was disappointed in the performance of his former team, Manchester United (who could barely draw with the team currently in last place).

They played well in the first half, but not in the second, which upset their former star. “It wasn’t the performance you want to see; a wholesome performance over 90 minutes,” he sighed.

Oh well, an easy mistake to make, we’ve all done it. It’s that misleading ‘whole’ business, which should really mean ‘from start to finish’. Alas, when you add ‘some’ to it, it doesn’t.

‘Wholesome’ describes a combination of mental, moral and physical health, a sort of state Juvenal described as mens sana in corpore sano. Did Rio study Latin at school? By the sound of him, he didn’t even study English.

Speaking of language, I was amused at the ignorance of our Russian correspondents. One would think that intimate familiarity with the Russian language and ethos should be a job requirement.

Yet they were baffled by a line uttered by Putin at the joint press conference with Macron. When the subject of the Minsk Accords came up, a reporter pointed out that the Russians violate them so regularly that the Accords are for all practical purposes invalid.

“Like it or not, my beauty, you have to put up with it,” replied Putin, which line, rhymed in Russian, confused our pundits. Some guessed he was referring to the Ukraine as ‘a beauty’, but they didn’t know why.

Others, probably prompted by their Russophone colleagues, wrote that this “kind of language… attempts to justify rape”. It doesn’t. The phrase nravitsia, ne nravitsia, spi moia krasavitsa refers to necrophilia, not rape.

On second thoughts, since a corpse can’t by definition give consent, perhaps the difference is slight. The point is that Putin used a catchphrase known to every Russian.

It comes from a chastushka, one of the four-line rhymes that originated in the villages. However, at some time in the sixties the urban intelligentsia got hold of the genre, producing thousands of ditties, mostly obscene, taking the mickey out of, well, everything – including the genre itself and its original practitioners.

The closest English equivalent is the limerick, but with one salient difference. Some limericks are more popular than others, but none of them is universally known. Thus a British politician can’t expect to be widely understood if he adorned his address with the last line of a popular limerick: “And instead of coming he went”.

Some of you may know the whole (wholesome?) thing, but I’m willing to bet some of you don’t. Yet most Russians would have no trouble identifying the provenance of Putin’s gag: chastushkas have a much wider reach than limericks.

The one he quoted is about a chap copulating (the original uses a more robust word) with the corpse of his dead girlfriend, which puts the last two lines into context. This rhyme has most Russians in stitches, something that outlanders are incapable of understanding.

I’ve been trying for the better part of 40 years to convert Penelope to this type of poetry, but in vain. I’ve even translated some chastushkas in rhyme and metre, which labour of love has been rewarded by a polite smile at best. Might as well give up now.

The question remains whether or not the president of a nuclear superpower should make such references in public. What’s permitted at home, over a bottle shared with friends, sounds like extreme vulgarity and crassness when used at a summit press conference.

But who says a KGB officer has to be a nuanced stylist? I wouldn’t even suggest it – any more than I’d insist that Rio Ferdinand learn the meaning of ‘wholesome’.