A Word In Your Shell-Like. Nigel Rees
with sex. It can cover all human activity. About 1989 there were T-shirts for jaded travellers with the words: ‘Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.’
(I have) been to the mountain top As in Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s speech at Memphis (3 April 1968), the night before he was assassinated: ‘I’ve been to the mountain top…I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the promised land.’ The original promised land (not called as such in the Bible but referring to Canaan, western Palestine, and by association, Heaven) was promised to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In Numbers 14:39–40: ‘Moses told these sayings unto all the children of Israel…And they rose up early in the morning and gat them up into the top of the mountain, saying, Lo, we be here, and will go up unto the place which the Lord hath promised.’
beer See I’M ONLY HERE.
beer and sandwiches at No. 10 An encapsulation of the informal (and often eleventh-hour) style of negotiation held at senior level (and quite often at the Prime Minister’s residence, No. 10, Downing Street) between British trade unionists and politicians to avert threatened strikes and stoppages. These only really took place under the Labour administrations of Harold Wilson (1964–70, 1974–6). Nothing like it was known under Margaret Thatcher, who seldom, if ever, conversed with union leaders, let alone offered them any form of hospitality. Some called it a pragmatic approach; others viewed it less favourably. Phillip Whitehead (a one-time Labour MP) was quoted in The Independent (25 April 1988) as having said of Wilson that he ‘bought the hours with beer and sandwiches at No. 10 and the years with Royal Commissions’. Compare ‘coffee and Danish at the White House’ – an expression from the Carter administration for the breakfasts of coffee and Danish pastries offered by the President to Congressional leaders and others to win them over.
(life isn’t all) beer and skittles An apparently late-appearing proverb (1855), urging that life is not just about simple pleasures or unalloyed enjoyment – specifically the drinks and games you would find in a pub, the British yeoman’s idea of heaven on earth. From Thomas Hughes, Tom Brown’s Schooldays (1857): ‘Life isn’t all beer and skittles, – but beer and skittles, or something better of the same sort, must form a good part of every Englishman’s education.’
(the) beer that made Milwaukee famous The Schlitz Brewing Company had its roots in an operation begun in Milwaukee in 1849. By 1871, the year of the great Chicago fire, it was a thriving concern. The fire left Chicago thirsty; the city was desperately short of drinking water, and its breweries had virtually been destroyed. So Joseph Schlitz floated a shipload of beer down Lake Michigan to refresh his parched neighbours. They liked and remembered Milwaukee beer long after the crisis passed. It is not known who coined the phrase, but this is the incident that inspired it. The slogan was incorporated and registered in 1895, and was in use until production ceased in the 1980s.
(the) bee’s knees ‘The very best around; absolutely top hole’. There has always been a fascination with bees’ knees. In the 18th century there was the expression ‘as big as a bee’s knee’ and, in the 19th, ‘as weak as a bee’s knee’. But the bee whose knees became celebrated in US slang by 1923 was probably only there because of the rhyme. At about the same time, we find the kipper’s knickers, the cat’s whiskers (perhaps because of the importance of these in tuning wireless crystal sets in the 1920s), the cat’s pyjamas (still new enough to be daring), ‘the cat’s miaow/eyebrows/ankles/tonsils/adenoids/ galoshes/cufflinks/roller skates’. Not to mention ‘the snake’s hips’, ‘the clam’s garter’, ‘the eel’s ankle’, ‘the elephant’s instep’, ‘the tiger’s spots’, ‘the flea’s eyebrows’, ‘the canary’s tusks’, ‘the leopard’s stripes’, ‘the sardine’s whiskers’, ‘the pig’s wings’ – ‘and just about any combination of animal, fish, or fowl with a part of the body or clothing that was inappropriate for it’ – Flexner (1976).
before See HERE AND NOW.
before one can say ‘Jack Robinson’ (or as quick as…) This expression, meaning ‘immediately; straight away’, appears to have been alluded to by Richard Brinsley Sheridan in the House of Commons (some time after 1780) to avoid using a fellow member’s name (as was, and is partly still, the custom there). Having made a derogatory reference to the Secretary to the Treasury, John Robinson, and been asked by members shouting ‘Name, name’ to disclose the person he was referring to, Sheridan said, ‘You know I cannot name him, but I could – as soon as I can say Jack Robinson’ – quoted in Hesketh Pearson, Lives of the Wits (1962). Clearly, Sheridan was alluding to an already established expression. Neil Ewart in Everyday Phrases (1983) cites the theory that it ‘refers to an erratic [18th-century] gentleman of that name who rushed around to visit his neighbours, rang the front-door bell, and then changed his mind and dashed off before the servant had time to announce his name’. Eric Partridge in his Name Into Word (1949) suggests that it was a made-up name using very common first and last elements. Fanny Burney has ‘I’ll do it as soon as say Jack Robinson’ in her novel Evelina, Letter 82 (1778), so that pushes back the date somewhat. A promising explanation is that the phrase may have something to do with Sir John Robinson who was Officer Commanding the Tower of London 1660–79. In that case, the original reference may have been to the speed of beheading with an axe – as discussed in The Observer (24 April 1988).
(it) beggars all description A light literary turn of phrase for what is indescribable and originating with the meaning of the verb ‘to beggar’ in the sense ‘to exhaust the resources of’. Apparently this was an original coinage of Shakespeare in Antony and Cleopatra, II.ii.197 (1607), where Enobarbus says of Cleopatra: ‘For her own person, / It beggar’d all description’. ‘Let us begin the tale in 1755 when an entranced visitor to the park [Painshill] wrote: “Pray follow me to Mr Hamilton’s. I must tell you it beggars all description, the art of hiding art is here in such sweet perfection”’ – Financial Times (23 April 1988); ‘A place which beggars all description’ – Mrs Piozzi, Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey Through France &c. (1789); ‘Of the massacre itself that followed, where shall I begin and what shall I tell? It simply beggars all description. Occidentals of the 19th century cannot comprehend it. Still, I will try to give a few facts’ – The Times (29 March 1895).
be good – and if you can’t be good be careful! A nudging farewell, possibly originating with the American song ‘Be Good! If You Can’t Be Good, Be Careful!’ (1907). It is the same sort of farewell remark as don’t do anything I wouldn’t do! that probably dates from the same period.
be good but not so frightfully good that someone says to you, ‘Ah, and now what mischief are you up to?’ A rather extended catchphrase. On the BBC radio Children’s Hour by 1932 and into the early 1940s, there was a man called Commander Stephen King Hall who gave talks in an unhurried, avuncular voice, explaining current events (of which there were quite a few in those days) to his young listeners. And at the end he would sign off in this characteristic way. On 17 February 1941, after talking about the progress of the war, he ended: ‘And now I think I’ll give you a saying which some of you will know: Be Good but not so frightfully good that someone at once says, “Mmm, and now what mischief are you up to?” Well, goodbye and good luck.’
be good to yourself Sign-off from Don McNeill, homely American radio star, on the air 1934–68.
(to) beg the question Nowadays an expression frequently misused in place of ‘to pose a question’. For example, ‘I had a ghastly holiday in France which begs the question of why I went there in the first place.’ The phrase (in English by 1581) really means ‘to take for granted the matter in dispute, to assume without proof.’ Or, more precisely, ‘to take into consideration as part of your proof the thing you are trying to prove’. The process is apparent from these two exchanges: ‘Q. Why do parallel lines never meet?’ ‘A. Because they are parallel.’ ‘Q.