Prickly bush

Hello,

In the book "Parrot and Olivier in America" by Peter Carey, Oliver, a French noble, is writing a book about American, Americans and their habits. Parrot, his servant and secretary, has to rewrite his notes. Olivier has also written an essay on the problem of naming plants and birds in new countries. And Parrot says:

"I had already transcribed his essay on the problem of naming plants and birds in new countries and how screech owl and prickly bush, for instance, sounded like the language of children."

So, "prickly bush" should be a name of a plant that sounds to Parot like "the language of children". As I am translating this book, I need to translate the name of this plant. But I don't know what plant it is. In Czech it sounds to me like any bush with thorns. Is there any specific plant in English which is called "prickly bush" in the colloquial speech and which has perhaps another name?

Thank you very much for any help.

In English "prickly bush" would mostly be descriptive, just as you say it is in Czech. However, there may be a specific species of plant whose common name (not colloquial, but "common") is the prickly bush. I don't know it, but in Australia there is a plant called the "prickly bush-pea" (Pultenaea juniperina), and there are many plant species or families called the "prickly" something: the prickly pear (Opuntia); prickly broom; prickly cedar, etc.

The point is that these names sound "childish" even though they are the proper common names for these plants because they are newly named in English. Our "Old World" plants generally have names based on very old words or words from other languages, so that their often no less simple descriptive meanings are hidden.

Some "Old World" plants have common names like this; e.g. "bindweed" (convolvulus), so called because it wraps itself around other plants (and things), thus binding them. The Latin name sounds formal or scientific, but its meaning is very similar to the plain-sounding English one.

Thank you very much. It is great help. I think that now I can "solve" it somehow.

There is a native American plant, according to the leading garden encyclopedia here, called "Prickly Ash" (Zanthoxylum americanum). It's described as a "shrub or small tree", with "the young branches having thorns or prickles".

Does that help?

The following might help, or might just confuse !

I haven't read the "Parrot and Oliver" books; but they are originally in English, are they not? -- even if, as EvaH's first post seems to imply, the joint heroes are French.

There is an English folk song, "The Prickly Bush" -- or (rustic mispronunciation of the adjective), "prickle-eye". Might one speculate that associations on some level in Parrot's mind, with the song, perhaps contribute to his choice of words?

The song's chorus:

Oh, the prickle-eye bush, the prickle-eye bush,
The prickle-eye bush so sore;
If I ever get out of the prickle-eye bush,
I'll never go in there no more.

I'm guessing prickly bush is a dated name for some plant. I have to deal with this all the time when I do research for environmental history; people in historical sources use unrecognizable names for things. (Like "Lynn" for Basswood; it took me awhile to figure that one out.) They can also be very localized. Sometimes these older names persist in rural settings.

Prickly ash seems like a good bet. (Prickly ash is not an ash at all; it just has similar-looking leaves. It's actually related to citrus trees. So, that reinforces the point in the example that American names for plants are kind of silly and arbitrary!) However, you'd have to find some other historical sources to be sure. Honestly I'd suggest rendering "prickly bush" literally in Czech, as the point of the passage is that calling a plant with a descriptive name like that sounds childish.

Thanks for your answers. They are all very interesting. I have managed to find this information:

Interesting! We do have different species of holly in North America than in England, but it doesn't seem like that would make sense in context (since it would be carrying over the Old World name rather than making up a new one). Of course, it's possible the speaker is not aware that people from the British Isles use "prickly bush" for holly, and just thinks it's an American innovation...

Edit: you might also try pricklebush or pricker bush as search terms. Seems I've heard these before.

I write in ignorance of Carey, but with the knowledge that Appalachian folksongs, as collected by Maud Karpeles, are closely related to English ones, sometimes preserving older versions or variants than have survived in these isles. So - where are they in the States?

For "pricker bush" I have googled this interesting info:


So it could also be the "bull thistle".

mikerotheatre said:

I write in ignorance of Carey, but with the knowledge that Appalachian folksongs, as collected by Maud Karpeles, are closely related to English ones, sometimes preserving older versions or variants than have survived in these isles. So - where are they in the States?

The plot takes place partly in New York and partly in Wethersfield, Connecticut in the 1830's.

EvaH said:

For "pricker bush" I have googled this interesting info:

Answer:
Technically, a pricker bush is the generic name of a family of plants. The family is called Asteraceae. Not all plants are spiny.It consists of the Bull Thistle, Canada Thistle, Perennial Sowthistle, Yellow Hawkweed, Orange Hawkweed, Dandelion and several other Dandelion look-alikes. None of the plants are poisonous. Although the term Pricker Bush applies to the family, most use this term to describe the Bull Thistle, a plant the resembles a Dandelion with large, sharp spines on its leaves. It may grow as a patch or as a wide, tall bush of spines.

It is on this site:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_a_pricker_bush

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So it could also be the "bull thistle".

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Hmm, bull thistle is an invasive, meaning it's probably of European origin:
http://dnr.wi.gov/invasives/fact/thistles_bull.htm

Could be a different thistle, though.

Edit: As an aside, the aster family is large and varied. Most aster relatives are not prickly or bush-like.