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What does 'she made the nipping off of noggins such a crystal mystery' mean? What is 'noggins and choppers' in context?
When your mama was the geek, my dreamlets,” Papa would say, “she made the nipping off of noggins such a crystal mystery that the hens themselves yearned toward her, waltzing around her, hypnotized with longing. ‘Spread your lips, sweet Lil,’ they’d cluck, ‘and show us your choppers!’ ”
Geek Love. A novel by Katherine Dunn
This is not comprehensible language. There are words that we might know: "Geek" here means "circus freak", "Noggin" is normally "head" but might have a special meaning in circus slang, "choppers" might mean teeth. But a native speaker is not able to understand what this all means.
The effect is to puzzle the reader, and draw them in. We have to read more to begin to understand what "papa" is saying. So don't worry about what it exactly means. Papa's monologue is strange and charming. It makes us want to find out what happens next.
