Red Herrings and White Elephants: Albert Jack

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Starts off really well, entertaining and engaging. There are some great explanations about frequently used sayings in there. My favourites included "winning hands down" and "to be screwed." Example: The London Bridge became a white elephant. The bridge was relocated to Havasu City Arizona, where it now remains as a tourist attraction. voir des éléphants roses” (= to see pink elephants) which refers to hallucination supposedly brought by abuse of alcohol. But the roots of “dicey” lie, not in the clouds, but on the gambling tables (or the floor of an RAF hangar). “Dicey” comes from “dice,” the plural of “die,” the little spotted cubes of chance used in many games. A mission that was “dicey” to the RAF pilots was fraught with danger, and their safe return was as uncertain as a roll of the dice they often used to pass their time on the ground. This sense of both chance and danger has carried over to our modern use of “dicey” to mean “seriously risky,” often with overtones of disaster if the effort fails. This book is absolutely amazing I read it while in hospital and I cannot say how fantastic this book is and the quality of the book as well I bought this for my mum and she has really really enjoyed it. Thank you

Red Herrings and White Elephants: The Origins of the Phrases Red Herrings and White Elephants: The Origins of the Phrases

For me this doesn't really explain it satisfactorily. What about the info about the root of the Latin proverb? (although according to my sources the phrase comes from a collection of medieval French poems "Li Proverbe au Vilain" which was published around 1190) - & the little quip at the end... not my sense of humour.

It is interesting to note that most of the sayings do not even originate from the English language, and are cobbled up from Anglo-Saxon, Latin, Greek, French, Swedish, Norse (when it's raining cats and dogs or when someone went berserk), Hindustani (when someone has gone Doolally), Jewish (when you tell someone to eat his heart out) and even Gaelic (when you declared something as phoney), just to name a few.

Red Herrings and White Elephants by Albert Jack | Goodreads

Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2020-09-08 14:05:18 Bookplateleaf 0004 Boxid IA1926801 Camera Sony Alpha-A6300 (Control) Collection_set printdisabled External-identifier I never questioned the origin of While Elephants, Red Herrings, or any of the other many ideomatic phrases that we use everyday, but a friend of mine bought me this book and I was blown away! biblioboy, Ebooksweb COM LLC, Phillybooks COM LLC, BookCorner COM LLC, BookCorner COM LLC, Phillybooks COM LLC, Ebooksweb COM LLC, Phillybooks COM LLC, Ebooksweb COM LLC, BookCorner COM LLC, Washburn Books, thelondonbookworm.comNot sure it’s what you had in mind but concerning phrases with colour adjective+animal, in French we have the following sayings and phrases: This is a British book, and so some of the phrases were unfamiliar to me. But that's a relative few. The majority are phrases within my experience. The Origins of the Phrases We Use Everyday - The biggest selling non-fiction book of the decade..... Mad hatter . . . pie in the sky . . . egg on your face. We use these phrases every day, yet how many of us know what they really mean or where they came from?

Red Herrings and White Elephants by - Perlego [PDF] Red Herrings and White Elephants by - Perlego

If you opt for the hair of the dog the morning after, you're following the advice of medieval English doctors, who recommended rubbing the hair of a dog into the wound left by the animal's bite. une oie blanche” (= a white goose) refers to a young woman, naive and unenlightened regarding the birds and the bees.Teachers of the language, especially one teaching ESL (English as a Second Language), would benefit from the book as well. At the first sign of boredom your class shows in an English course (you should be able to notice the blank looks and nodding heads), swipe Red Herring and White Elephants out and start to ask them why certain phrases are so. Choose the most ridiculous ones or ones which meaning is almost unrelated to its phrase (I think none will catch more attention than 'to swear on your testicles'). Entertain them with the origin and its story, and watch your students swarm to your class with expectation on the next class. That will drill the language into them better than any other method.