Linda Berdoll - Very Nice Ways to Say Very Bad Things An Unusual Book of Euphemisms

VeryNiceWays_FINAL 7/19/07 10:20 AM Page 1 Ver Are you tired of hearing those same y Ni seven naughty words again and again? ce W Very Nice Ways to Say Did you elcome to a world of truly polite know that there is Wways to say the worst. aan obscene gestureys t VERY BAD THINGS that is both older and Euphemisms serve a greater purpose more universally than merely keeping the ladies at a gar o Sarecognized than digitus den party from glaring at us over the An unusual book of euphemisms impudicus? top of their spectacles. A few mincing Do you words can also keep lawyers at bay. This yknow subtle art of the insult can exact what digitus V revenge without fear of retribution. impudicusis? ER Very Nice Ways to Say Very Bad Things Y is also chock full of obscure facts about And just common terms. It will be impossible B what is for readers to find a page that doesnt A the Clinton enlighten or delight.

D Exculpation? T Why is an H Likewiseimprocreant I excrementum N Acerebellummale called G shitepoke?vincit?a mule? S Berdo $12.95 U.S./ $16.95 CAN/6.99 UK ISBN-13: 978-1-4022-0885-0 Humor ISBN-10: 1-4022-0885-5 EAN ll www.sourcebooks.com L i n d a B e r d o l l 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page i Very Nice Ways to Say Very Bad Things g w g w 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page ii 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page iii Very ice N waysto say Very Things An Unusual Book of Euphemisms by Linda Berdoll 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page iv Copyright 2003, 2007 by Linda Berdoll Cover 2007 by Sourcebooks, Inc. Internal design 2003 Carol Sue Hagood Internal graphics 2003 Carol Sue Hagood and Johnny Alvarez Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systemsexcept in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviewswithout permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc. Published by Sourcebooks Hysteria, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc. P.O.

Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410 (630) 961-3900 Fax: (630) 961-2168 www.sourcebooks.com Originally published in 2003. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Berdoll, Linda Very Nice Ways to Say Very Bad Things / Linda Berdoll p. cm. ISBN-13: 978-1-4022-0885-0 ISBN-13: 978-1-4022-2983-1 ISBN-10: 1-4022-0885-5 ISBN-10: 1-4022-2983-6 1. English languageEuphemism. 2.

English languageJargon. 3. English languageTerms and phrases. I. Title. PE1449.B4435 2007 427dc22 2006100787 Printed and bound in the United States of America.

WC 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page v Contents Aspersions, brickbats, carping, cavil, censure, denunciation, disparagement, reproach, opprobrium, reproof, stricture, vitriol, epithets, and vituperation 1v Censuring the Inherent Fool: The Lost Art Shakespeare, Addressing Individual Mounds of Foul, Undigested Lumps of Donkey Entrails Sacre Bleu: Profanities and Expletives Oaths and General Vituperation Silent Disparagement (The Bird and His Friends) 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page vi Circumlocution 33 Worshipping at the Shrine of Bacchus Fits, disease, ill health, infirmity, breakdowns, affliction, ailment, attacks, bugs, collapse, complaint, confinement, convalescence, disability, disorder, disturbance, dose, failing health, flu, indisposition, malady, malaise, prostration, seizure, syndrome, v a bit of unwell, and whats been going around 53 Indisposition Going to Europe with Ralphand Earl in a Buick In the Privy Afflicted by Times Wingd Chariot 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page vii Gender specific activity, femininity, manhood, manliness, masculinity, sexuality, womanhood, womanliness, intercourse between animate beings, coition, coitus, copulation, fornication, generation, intimacy, lovemaking, magnetism, procreation, relations, reproduction, sensuality, sexuality 73v Bewitched, Bothered and Betwattled The Long Carbine Dallying, Firkytoodling and Finkdiddling Sex Sain et Sauf Men Behaving Badly 00FM.qxd 7/13/07 4:30 PM Page viii A Pea in the Pod Misbegotten Unknown to Man Trafficking with Oneself Daft, mentally strange, barmy, unzipped, batty, berserk, insane, bonkers, cracked, loony, crazed, cuckoo, demented, deranged, peculiar, erratic, flaky, fruity, idiotic, insane, lunatic, mad, maniacal, nuts, potty, psycho, touched, v unbalanced, unglued, unhinged, wacky The Gazelles are in the Garden N What? Acknowledgements 1-19.qxd 7/13/07 4:32 PM Page 1 spersions, brickbats, carping, cavil, censure, denunciation, disparagement, reproach, opprobrium, reproof, stricture, vitriol, epithets, and vituperation 1-19.qxd 7/13/07 4:32 PM Page 2 You clod of puke-stocking, roastmeat for worms! Zounds, I have been bethumped by words.Shakespeare 1-19.qxd 7/13/07 4:32 PM Page 3 Censuring the Inherent Fool: The Lost Art Few would argue that some behavior is so abhorrent, it demands redressing. Regardless of justificationidiot drivers, impudent clerks, adolescents who have been spawn by the devilwe as a society simply cannot con-done smacking the offender upside the head. (Admittedly, we institute this decision partly in deference to decorum, but also in the distinct possibility that said transgressor might be packing heat.) Since throwing the bric-a-brac can become prohibitively expensive, our only alternative is to let fly with a few choice words. That acknowledged, it is miserably apparent that standards about what is said or heard in public have become remarkably lax. What comes out of the mouths of babes nowadays would have once made a fishwife blush. Not that we deplore vehement notification of character flaws, but 3