Peter Bush was born in Spalding, Lincolnshire, on 18 March, 1946.
His dad came from a local village, Pinchbeck, and his mum from Sheffield. They both spoke non-standard English of different kinds, so he was brought up speaking a dialect as his first form of English. When he went to the council school at the age of five, his teacher told him I didn’t speak properly and that that would have to change. Of course, he already spoke standard English as did his parents. He just hadn’t felt it to be as much his and his family’s as their dialect. His experience of language, translation and the English public sphere began then in 1951.