A Dictionary of Euphemisms and Other Doubletalk (1981)
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A DICTIONARY Euphemisms ^Other Doubletalk Being a Compilation of Linguistic Fig Leaves and Verbal Flourishes for Artful Users of the English Language HUGH RAWSON Sir— PRAISE WITHOUT DOUBLETALK—^ "Ever since the dreadful day when I was run out of town lor saying, just once, what I really thought, I have been in a desperate search tor ways to express my opinions without getting caught at it. Mr. Rawsons hilarious dictionary offers salvation to me and thousands like me. From now on 1 can cut my friends' throats in conversation, and they won't know until they turn their heads." -WillardR.Espy "Mr. Rawsons laundry list ol laundered words and ideas is endlessly enter taining, as well as scholarly. It demonstrates perfectly a universal and timeless human trait: our prolound unwillingness to say what we mean. —Clifton ladnnan "Helpful, informative, amusing."—Eifn>m Newman "No one interested in English common speech, and the historical and psycho logical reasons for its sly and often hilarious ways of evading plain language, should pass up this delightful dictionary.... A unique reference, a book to study, a book to dip into tor entertainment. Be prepared tor hundreds of surprises!" —Martin Gardner "An excellent book for reference today and tomorrow. It will most certainly be a classic—exceedingly funny yet scholarly: a sort of Dr. Johnson's dictionary for today, with no holds barred. Very seldom does the reader come across a work that informs and at the same time makes him roar with laughter. The Dktiomry does this. From which you will gather that I like it a lot. My compliments to the chef ."-Emily Habn "Very interesting"— John Train A DICTIONARY Euphemisms cVOther Doubletalk HUGHRAWSON • What did Brig. Gen. Anthony McAuliffe say when the Germans asked him to surrrender at Bas- togne? (The answer is not "Nuts!") • How was "expletive deleted" used to clean up President Nixon's actions as well as his language? • Why should you start running if there is a "core rearrangement" at the local nuclear power plant? • Who persuaded Gen. William Westmoreland to substitute "reconnaissance in force" for "search and destroy"? • The cute Vfek Disney character notwithstand ing, what does "Jiminy Cricket" really mean? The answers to these and a host of other provocative questions about language are contained in this com pletely cross-referenced, witty guidebook to thou sands of euphemisms (known as linguistic fig leaves) and doubletalk-including everything from "abat toir" to "zounds." This sardonic and entertaining exploration of words and phrases that camouflage true meanings ranges from squeamish evasions ("love that dare not speak its name" and "unmentionable") to monstrous fictions designed to disguise torture ("the water cure") and unspeakable mass murder ("the Final Solution"). Here are all the classic euphemisms of the eigh teenth and nineteenth centuries such as "bosom" "delicate condition" and "limb" along with the spe cialized vocabularies developed in recent times by the CIA (with its plans for "disposing" of unfriendly heads of state by means of "executive action"); by the FBI (with its "black-bag jobs" and "technical trespasses"); and by the military (Would you believe "soft ordnance" for "napalm"?). Here, too, are eu phemisms for enhancing occupational status (such as "sanitation man" and "mortician"), for refining "coarse" facts ("make love"), and for concealing dreaded ones ("pass away"). A Dictionary of Euphemisms & Other Doubletalk is espe cially valuable for including many examples of actual usage and for the amount of attention given to ori gins of expressions and first-known uses. A general introduction explains the ways in which euphe misms are formed and how chains of euphemisms are created as one term succeeds another. Here is a book that will appeal not only to people who use words with care and who care about how they are used by others but to the vast audience of people who enjoy browsing through collections of odd facts, presented in entertaining, anecdotal fashion. HUGH RAWSON was a newspaper reporter and mag azine editor before he turned to writing and editing books. A graduate of Yale University, he is coauthor of An Investment in Knowledge, a study done for the National Science Foundation. He lives in a brown- stone in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife, their two children, and a cat. Jacket design by David Giatti ADICTIONARY Euphemisms 3ther Doubletalk A DICTIONARY Euphemisms frOther Doubletalk Being a Compilation of Linguistic Fig Leaves and Verbal Flourishes for Artful Users of the English Language HUGH RAWSON Crown Publishers, Inc. New York Copyright © 1981 by Hugh Rawson Material from the New York Times: © 1956,1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980 by The New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission. Material from The New Yorker by Ken Auletta, © 1979. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Inquiries should be addressed to Crown Publishers, Inc., One Park Avenue, New York, New York 10016 Printed in the United States of America Published simultaneously in Canada by General Publishing Company Limited Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Rawson, Hugh. A dictionary of euphemisms & other double talk. Includes bibliographical references. 1. English language—Euphemism. I. Title. II. Title: Fig leaves and flourishes. PEl 449. R34 1981 428.1 81-4748 ISBN: 0-517-545187 AACR2 Designed by Fran Galle Nitneck 10 987654321 First Edition For Margaret, finally The tongue of man is a twisty thing, there are plenty of words there of every kind, the range of words is wide, and their variance. The Iliad of Homer, ca. 750 B. C. Richmond Lattimore, trans., 1951 There is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean. Romans, XIV, i4, ca. A.D. 56 King James Version, 1611 Acknowledgments & a Request Most sources are given in the text, but the influence of a few is so pervasive as to require special acknowledgment. First is the Oxford English Dictionary, edited by Sir James Murray, which I have used in the compact edition, published by Oxford University Press in 1971. The OED is a monument to the English language and it is hard to imagine any other dictionary—or compilation of euphemisms—being made without continually consulting it, as well as its recent supplements, edited by R. W. Burchfield (the first two volumes, issued in 1972 and 1976, go through the letter "N"). Nearly as well-thumbed were A Dictionary of American English on Historical Principles (Sir William A. Cragie and James R. Hurlburt, eds., University of Chicago Press, 1938-44, four volumes) and A Dictionary of Americanisms (Mitford M. Mathews, University of Chicago Press, 1951, two volumes). Also of great use were various works on slang: for British usage, A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (Eric Partridge, Macmillan, 1970) and A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (Capt. Francis Grose, ed. and annotated by Partridge, Barnes & Noble, 1963),- for American usage, the Dictionary of American Slang (Harold Wentworth and Stuart Berg Flexner, Thomas Y. Crowell, 1975), The Underground Dictionary (Eugene E. Landy, Simon & Schuster, paperback, 1971), The American Thesaurus of Slang (Lester V. Berrey and Melvin Van den Bark, Thomas Y. Crowell, 1953), and Playboy's Book of Forbidden Words, (Robert A. Wilson, éd., Playboy Press, 1972). Other particularly helpful books included A Dictionary of Contemporary American Usage (Bergen Evans and Cornelia Evans, Random House, 1957), I Hear America Talking (Stuart Berg Flexner, Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1976), Word Origins and Their Romantic Stories (Wilfrid Funk, Funk & Wagnalls, paperback, 1968), Personalities of Language (Gary Jennings, Thomas Y. Crowell, 1965), You English Words (John Moore, J. B. Lippincott, 1962), Safire's Political Dictionary (William Safire, Random House, 1978), and In Praise of English (Joseph T. Shipley, Times Books, 1977). One of the principal points of departure for the present work, as well as a valuable reference thereafter, was H. L. Mencken's The American Language (Alfred A. Knopf, 1936, and its supplements, 1945 and 1948). Back issues of the quarterly American Speech, published since 1925, also provided joy, inspiration, and information. The New York Times comes the closest to being the newspaper of record in the United States and, as such, preserves on its pages most of the best euphemisms of our time. It has been used accordingly. Another work that has been extremely valuable, not only for the intrinsic interest of the subject matter but as an unusual record of the way people actually talk in private, is The White House Transcripts (Richard M. Nixon, et al., introduction by R. W. Apple, Jr., Bantam Books, 1974). The manuscript benefitted from the readings of Patrick Barrett and Margaret Miner, most of whose criticisms were accepted gracefully as well as gratefully. The first draft was typed single-space on small slips of paper, which were easy for me to keep in alphabetical order but not so easy for typists to handle, and I wish to thank Gladys Garrastegui, Irene Goodman, Cynthia Kirk, and Karen Tracht- vii Acknowledgments man for so carefully, and cheerfully, converting the slips into usable copy. I also am indebted to Brandt Aymar and Rosemary Baer for shepherding the manuscript through to publication. Individuals who supplied euphemisms are too numerous to name: A few are mentioned in the citations for particular entries, many other people made suggestions that led to entries that are now tied to written sources. All contributors are greatly, and equally, thanked. On the chance that this book will go into a second edition, or result in a successor, readers are invited to send new examples of euphemisms, circumlocu- tions, and doubletalk to me, care of Crown Publishers, Inc., One Park Avenue, New York, New York 10016.