his poetry sequence, "Six Texts For a Film", in Birmingham River (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994). "Birmingham's what I think with. / It's not made for that sort of job,/ but it's what they gave me. / As a means of thinking, it's a Brummagem/ screwdriver" (lines 1–4). US usage In the US, the negative usage appears to have continued into the 1930s. F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1922 novel The Beautiful and Damned uses the word twice: "It was one of the type known as 'tourist' cars, a sort of brummagem Pullman ... a single patch of vivid green trees that guaranteed the brummagem umbrageousness of Riverside Drive". Gilbert Seldes, in his 1924 book The Seven Lively Arts, wrote in praise of Krazy Kat: "everything paste and brummagem has had its vogue with us; and a genuine, honest native product has gone unnoticed". It appears in two essays by H.L. Mencken from 1926: "Valentino" ("Consider the sordid comedy of his two marriages – the brummagem, star-spangled passion that invaded his very deathbed!") and "A Glance Ahead" ("It would be hard to find a country in which such brummagem serene highnesses are revered with more passionate devotion than they get in the United States."). Mencken's influence is apparent when the term appears in John Fante's 1939 novel Ask the Dust: "The church must go, it is the haven of the booboisie, of boobs and bounders and all brummagem mountebanks." Currently US collectors of political memorabilia use "brummagem" to refer to imitations. The Dictionary of Sexual Terms and Expressions by Farlex Inc., maintainers of TheFreeDictionary.com, lists several related terms such as "Brummagem buttons", tufts sewn to brassiere cups to give the appearance of larger nipples. Lemony Snicket, in his 1999 young adult novel The Reptile Room, introduces brummagem as a "rare word for 'fake'". Brummagem in song A song, "I Can't Find Brummagem", was written by James Dobbs (1781–1837), a Midland music hall entertainer. "The Birmingham School of Business School", a song by The Fall on the 1992 album Code: Selfish, about the "creative accounting techniques" of Trevor Long, a manager of the band, includes the lyric "Brummagem School of Business School". References External links Why Brummies Why not Birmies? Etymological article by Dr Carl Chinn Birmingham or Brummagem? Birmingham City Council page listing the name variants from William Hamper's 1880 booklet AN HISTORICAL CURIOSITY, by a Birmingham Resident, ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY-ONE