A Word In Your Shell-Like

(is there/have you) any more, Mrs Moore? Elaborations of ‘any more?’, from the British music-hall song ‘Don’t Have Any More, Mrs Moore!’ – written by Castling & Walsh (early 1900s) and performed by Lily Morris.

anyone for tennis? This perkily expressed inquiry from a character entering through French windows and carrying a tennis racquet has become established as typical of the ‘teacup’ theatre of the 1920s and 30s (as also in the forms who’s for tennis? and tennis, anyone?). A clear example of it being used has proved elusive, however, although there are many near misses. The opening lines of Part II of Strindberg’s Dance of Death (1901) are (in translation): ‘Why don’t you come and play tennis?’ A very near miss occurs in the first act of Shaw’s Misalliance (1910) in which a character asks: ‘Anybody on for a game of tennis?’ Teddie in Somerset Maugham’s The Circle (1921) always seems on the verge of saying it, but only manages, ‘I say, what about this tennis?’ Myra in Noël Coward’s Hay Fever (1925) says, ‘What a pity it’s raining, we might have had some tennis.’ Perhaps it is just another of those phrases that was never actually said in the form popularly remembered. Unfortunately, a terrible wild-goose chase was launched by Jonah Ruddy and Jonathan Hill in their book Bogey: The Man, The Actor, The Legend (1965). Describing Humphrey Bogart’s early career as a stage actor (circa 1921) they said: ‘In those early Broadway days he didn’t play menace parts. “I always made my entrance carrying a tennis racquet, baseball bat, or golf club. I was the athletic type, with hair slicked back and wrapped in a blazer. The only line I didn’t say was, ‘Give me the ball, coach, I’ll take it through.’ Yes, sir, I was Joe College or Joe Country Club all the time.” It was hard to imagine him as the originator of that famous theatrical line – “Tennis anyone?” – but he was.’ It is clear from this extract that the authors were merely adding their own gloss to what Bogart had said. Bartlett (1968) joined in and said it was his ‘sole line in his first play’. But Bogart (who died in 1957) had already denied ever saying it (quoted in Goodman, Bogey: The Good-Bad Boy and in an ABC TV documentary of 1974 using old film of him doing so). Alistair Cooke in Six Men (1977) is more cautious: ‘It is said he appeared in an ascot and blue blazer and tossed off the invitation Tennis, anyone?’ – and adds that Bogart probably did not coin the phrase. In British show business, it has been suggested that Leon Quatermaine, a leading man of the 1920s and 30s, was the first man to say it. In the form ‘Anyone for tennis?’ the phrase was used by J. B. Priestley as the title of a 1968 television play, and in 1981 it was converted into Anyone for Denis? by John Wells as the title of a farce guying Margaret Thatcher’s husband.

anyone we know? Originally, a straightforward request for information when told, say, that someone you know is getting married and you want to know to whom. Then it became a playful catchphrase: ‘She’s going to have a baby’ – ‘Who’s the father – anyone we know?’ The joke use certainly existed in the 1930s. In the film The Gay Divorcee (US 1934), Ginger Rogers states: ‘A man tore my dress off.’ A woman friend asks: ‘Anyone we know?’ ‘The moment from which many of us date the genre was when the curtain rose on a production by Harry Kupfer in the late 1970s – I think of a work by Richard Strauss – to reveal a set dominated by a huge phallus, occasioning, from one male in the stalls to his gentleman friend, the loud whisper: “Anyone we know, duckie?”’ – The Times (17 May 1986).

any one who…can’t be all bad Format phrase suggesting that something about which doubt has been expressed is really rather good. Perhaps the original is what Leo Rosten said about W. C. Fields (and not, as is sometimes reported, what Fields himself said of another): ‘Any man who hates children and dogs can’t be all bad’ (or ‘Anybody who hates dogs and babies can’t be all bad’). This was at a Masquers’ Club dinner (16 February 1939). Subsequently: ‘Anyone with a name like Hitler can’t be all that bad’ – Spike Milligan, The Last Goon Show of All (1972); ‘All the same, Garland and Rooney as Babes In Arms…plus long-lost tracks from Band Wagon and Good News and Brigadoon and It’s Always Fair Weather, can’t be all bad’ – Sheridan Morley in Theatreprint, Vol. 5, No. 95 (May 1995).

any port in a storm Meaning, metaphorically, ‘any roof over your head is better than none’ or ‘you can’t be choosy about shelter in adversity’. The phrase makes an early appearance in John Cleland’s Fanny Hill (1749): ‘I feeling pretty sensibly that it [her lover’s member] was going by the right door, and knocking desperately at the wrong one, I told him of it: “Pooh, says he, my dear, any port in a storm”.’

anything can happen and probably will The standard opening announcement of the BBC radio show Take It From Here (1948–59) was that it was a comedy programme ‘in which anything can happen and probably will.’ The show was based on literate scripts by Frank Muir (1920–98) and Denis Norden (b. 1922) and featured Jimmy Edwards (1920–88), Dick Bentley (1907–95) and June Whitfield (b. 1926) (who succeeded Joy Nichols).

anything for a laugh Casual reason given for doing something a little out of the ordinary, since the 1930s. P. G. Wodehouse, Laughing Gas (1936): ‘“Anything for a laugh” is your motto.’ In the 1980s it was combined with the similar phrases good for a laugh (itself used as the title of a book by Bennett Cerf in 1952) and game for anything to produce the title of the British TV show Game For a Laugh (1981–5). This consisted of various stunts and had elements of Candid Camera as it persuaded members of the public to take part in stunts both in and out of the studio. The title was much repeated by the presenters of the show, as in ‘Let’s see if so-and-so is game for a laugh…’

anything for a quiet life The Jacobean playwright Thomas Heywood used this proverbial phrase in his play Captives, Act 3, Sc. 3 (1624), but Thomas Middleton had actually entitled a play Anything For a Quiet Life (possibly written with John Webster) in about 1620. Swift included the phrase in Polite Conversation (1738) and Dickens incorporated it as a Wellerism in The Pickwick Papers, Chap. 43 (1837): ‘But anythin’ for a quiet life, as the man said wen he took the sitivation at the lighthouse.’

anything goes! Meaning, ‘there are no rules and restrictions here, you can do whatever you like.’ Popularized by the song and musical show with the title written by Cole Porter (1934). Compare the much older this is/it’s Liberty Hall, which was probably coined by Oliver Goldsmith in She Stoops To Conquer, Act 2 (1773): ‘This is Liberty-hall, gentlemen. You may do just as you please.’ W. W. Reade wrote a book with the title Liberty Hall (1860).

anything you say may be taken down and used in evidence against you The police ‘caution’ to a person who may be charged with a crime has had various forms in the UK. The version you might expect from reading fiction would go something like: ‘You are not obliged to say anything unless you wish to do so but, I must warn you, whatever you do say will be taken down and may be given in evidence against you.’ But this does not conform with modern practice. British police are advised that care should be taken to avoid any suggestion that evidence might only be used against a person, as this could prevent an innocent person making a statement that might help clear him of a charge. Old habits die hard, however. The phrase is etched on the national consciousness, and it must have been said at one time. Charles Dickens in Our Mutual Friend (1864–5) has Mr Inspector (an early example of a police officer in fiction) give ‘the caution’ (which he refers to as such) in these words: ‘It’s my duty to inform you that whatever you say, will be used against you’ (Bk 4, Chap. 12). Earlier, Dickens had Mr Bucket saying in Bleak House, Chap. 49 (1852–3): ‘It’s my duty to inform you that any observation you may make will be liable to be used against you.’ Examples of the ‘against you’ caution also appear in Sherlock Holmes short stories by Conan Doyle (1905 and 1917). In the US, the phrase may still be found. In Will (1980), G. Gordon Liddy describes what he said during a raid on Dr Timothy Leary’s house in connection with drugs charges (in March 1966): ‘I want you to understand that you don’t have to make any statement, and any statement you do make may be used against you in a court of law.’ A decision of the US Supreme Court (Miranda v. Arizona, 1966) – known as the Miranda Decision – requires law enforcement officials to tell anyone taken into custody that, inter alia, anything the person says can be used against them.

any time, any place, anywhere A line from Martini advertisements in the UK from the early 1970s. Barry Day of the McCann-Erickson advertising agency that coined the phrase agreed (1981) that there is more than a hint of Bogart in the line, but adds: ‘As a Bogart fan of some standing, with my union dues all paid up, I think I would have known if I had lifted from one of his utterances, but I honestly can’t place it.’ Possibly there is a hint of Harry Lime, too. In the film The Third Man (1949), Lime says (in the run-up to the famous cuckoo-clock speech): ‘When you make up your mind, send me a message – I’ll meet you any place, any time…’ Two popular songs of the 1920s were ‘Anytime, Any Day, Anywhere’ and ‘Anytime, Anywhere, Any Place – I Don’t Care’. The exact phrase ‘any time, any place, anywhere’ had occurred, however, before the Martini ads in the song ‘I Love To Cry at Weddings’ from the musical Sweet Charity (1966) and in the film script of Tennessee Williams’s Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (US 1958). Precisely as ‘Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere’, it was the title of an R&B hit for Joe Morris in the US (1950) – sung by Little Laurie Tate. Even earlier it was spoken in the film The Strawberry Blonde (US 1941) of which the last lines are: ‘When I want to kiss my wife, I’ll kiss her anytime, anyplace, anywhere. That’s the kind of hairpin I am’ – this was written by the Epstein brothers who co-wrote Casablanca, so perhaps that is the Bogart connection? And then in His Girl Friday (US 1940), Cary Grant says to Rosalind Russell: ‘I’d know you anytime, anyplace, anywhere’ – having just re-met his ex-wife, he is recalling a line he had used to her on the night he proposed. In April 1987, a woman called Marion Joannou was jailed at the Old Bailey for protecting the man who had strangled her husband. She was nicknamed ‘Martini Marion’ because, apparently, she would have sex ‘any time, any place, anywhere’.

a-okay Another way of saying ‘OK’ or ‘All systems working’. From NASA engineers in the early days of the US space effort ‘who used to say it during radio transmission tests because the sharper sound of “A” cut through the static better than “O”’ – Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff (1979). Now largely redundant, it seems never to have been used by astronauts themselves. President Reagan, emerging from a day of medical tests at a naval hospital in June 1986, pronounced himself ‘A-OK’. Another derivation is that ‘a-okay’ is a melding of ‘A1’ and ‘OK’.

‘appen ‘It may happen; happen it may; maybe; perhaps’ – a North of England dialect expression, used for example by Uncle Mort (Robin Bailey), the scuffling, seedy old misogynist in Peter Tinniswood’s funereal Yorkshire comedy series I Didn’t Know You Cared on BBC TV (1975–9).

apple See AMERICAN AS.

(to be the) apple of one’s eye To be what one cherishes most or holds most dear. The pupil of the eye has long been known as the ‘apple’ because of its supposed round, solid shape. To be deprived of the apple is to be blinded and lose something extremely valuable. The Bible has: ‘He kept him as the apple of his eye’ in Deuteronomy 32:10.

apple-pie order Meaning ‘with everything in place; smart’, this expression (known since 1780) possibly derives from the French cap-à-pied, wearing armour ‘from head to foot’. Another suggested French origin is from nappe pliée, a folded tablecloth or sheet – though this seems a more likely source for the term apple-pie bed, known since 1781, for a bed made so that you can’t get into it. On the other hand, a folded cloth or napkin does convey the idea of crispness and smartness.

(an) appointment in Samarra An appointment with Death, or one that simply cannot be avoided. The novel Appointment in Samarra (1934) by John O’Hara alludes to the incident – described also by W. Somerset Maugham in his play Sheppey (1933) – in which a servant is jostled by Death in the market at Baghdad. Terrified, he jumps on a horse and rides to Samarra (a city in northern Iraq) where he thinks Death will not be able to find him. When the servant’s master asks Death why he treated him in this manner, Death replies that he had merely been surprised to encounter the servant in Baghdad…‘I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.’ The story appears earlier in Jean Cocteau, Le Grand Écart (1923) – translator not known: ‘A young Persian gardener said to his Prince: “Save me! I met Death in the garden this morning, and he gave me a threatening look. I wish that by tonight, by some miracle, I might be far away, in Ispahan.” The Prince lent him his swiftest horse. That afternoon, as he was walking in the garden, the Prince came face to face with Death. “Why,” he asked, “did you give my gardener a threatening look this morning?” “It was not a threatening look,” replied Death. “It was an expression of surprise. For I saw him there this morning, and I knew that I would take him in Ispahan tonight”.’

approbation from Sir Hubert Stanley is praise indeed Ironic comment on the source of praise or compliment. There is no actual Sir Hubert Stanley in Who Was Who or the DNB. However, there is a Sir Herbert Stanley, colonial administrator (1872–1955) who might fit the bill. But no, the origin of this remark is the line ‘Approbation from Sir Hubert Stanley is praise indeed’ which comes from the play A Cure for the Heartache, Act 5, Sc. 2 (1797) by the English playwright Thomas Morton (?1764–1838). Charles Dickens has ‘Praise from Sir Hubert Stanley’ in Dombey and Son, Chap. 1 (1846–8). P. G. Wodehouse uses the expression as ‘this is praise from Sir Hubert Stanley’ in both Psmith Journalist, Chap. 15 (1915) and Piccadilly Jim, Chap. 18 (1918). It is alluded to in Dorothy L. Sayers, Gaudy Night, Chap. 15 (1935): ‘At the end of the first few pages [Lord Peter Wimsey] looked up to remark: “I’ll say one thing for the writing of detective fiction: you know how to put your story together; how to arrange the evidence.” “Thank you,” said Harriet drily; “praise from Sir Hubert is praise indeed”.’

après nous le déluge [after us, the flood] The Marquise de Pompadour’s celebrated remark to Louis XV was made on 5 November 1757 after Frederick the Great had defeated the French and Austrian armies at the Battle of Rossbach. It carries with it the suggestion that nothing matters once you are dead and has also been interpreted as a premonition of the French Revolution. Bartlett (1980) notes that this ‘reputed reply’ by the king’s mistress was recorded by three authorities, though a fourth gives it to the king himself. Bartlett then claims the saying was not original anyway but ‘an old French proverb’. However, the ODP has as an English proverb, ‘After us the deluge’…deriving from Mme de Pompadour. Its only citation is Burnaby’s Ride to Khiva (1876): ‘Our rulers did not trouble their heads much about the matter. “India will last my time…and after me the Deluge”.’ Metternich, the Austrian diplomat and chancellor, may later have said ‘après moi le déluge’, meaning that everything would grind to a halt when he stopped controlling it. The deluge alluded to in all cases is a dire event like the Great Flood or ‘universal deluge’ of Noah’s time.

Aquarius See AGE OF.

Arabs See FOLD ONE’S TENTS.

aren’t plums cheap? Catchphrase of the British music-hall ‘Naval Comic’, Bob Nelson, of whom no other information is to hand. In The Bandsman’s Daughter (1979), Irene Thomas recalls, ‘One comedian acrobat who towards the end of his act used to do a handstand balanced on the back of a chair. Then, upside down, he’d turn his poor old beetroot coloured face towards the audience and croak, apropos nothing, “Aren’t plums cheap today?”’

aren’t we all? In Frederick Lonsdale’s play Aren’t We All? (1924) – the title proving that the phrase was well established by then – the Vicar says, ‘Grenham, you called me a bloody old fool,’ and Lord Grenham replies, ‘But aren’t we all, old friend?’ Ray Henderson composed the song ‘I’m a Dreamer, Aren’t We All’ in 1929. The collusive use has possibly weakened and the phrase become a simple jokey retort or a way of coping with an unintentional double entendre: ‘I’m afraid I’m coming out of my trousers’ – ‘Aren’t we all, dear, aren’t we all?’

aren’t you the lucky one? Congratulatory phrase from the 1920s, tinged with mockery but no envy.

are there any more at home like you? Partridge/ Catch Phrases traces this chat-up line to the musical comedy Floradora (1899), which contains the song (written by Leslie Stuart) ‘Tell Me, Pretty Maiden (Are There Any More At Home Like You?)’ Partridge adds that the line was ‘obsolete by 1970 – except among those with long memories’. Indeed, Tom Jones may be heard saying it to a member of the audience on the album Tom Jones Live at Caesar’s Palace Las Vegas (1971).

are we downhearted? – no! A morale-boosting phrase connected with the early stages of the First World War but having political origins before that. The politician Joseph Chamberlain said in a 1906 speech: ‘We are not downhearted. The only trouble is, we cannot understand what is happening to our neighbours.’ The day after he was defeated as candidate in the Stepney Borough Council election of 1909, Clement Attlee, the future British Prime Minister, was greeted by a colleague with the cry, ‘Are we downhearted?’ (He replied, ‘Of course, we are.’) On 18 August 1914, the Daily Mail reported: ‘For two days the finest troops England has ever sent across the sea have been marching through the narrow streets of old Boulogne in solid columns of khaki…waving as they say that new slogan of Englishmen: “Are we downhearted?…Nooooo!” “Shall we win?…Yessss!”’ Horatio Nicholls (Lawrence Wright) incorporated the phrase into a song (1917).

are yer courtin’ [are you courting]? Stock phrase from the BBC radio show Have A Go (1946–67) – what the host, Wilfred Pickles, would say when chatting up unmarried women contestants of any age (‘from nineteen to ninety’).

are you all right? Fanny’s all right! Stock phrase of the American actress, comedienne and singer Fanny Brice (1891–1951).

are you a man or a mouse? Usually said by a female disparagingly of a timorous male, this seems to have originated in the US, by the 1930s. A correspondent, Irene Summers (1998), remembered it being a feature of an Eddie Cantor film, Strike Me Pink (1935): ‘Eddie played a coward as usual, working in a dry cleaners. He triumphed in the end, beat the bullies and got the girl. When we came out, the attendants gave us little coins, with a mouse on one side and a man on the other, with the words, “Are you a man or a mouse?” and “See Eddie Condon in ‘Strike Me Pink’”.’ In the Marx Bros’ film A Day At the Races (1937) Alan Jones asks it of Groucho, who replies: ‘You put a piece of cheese down here and you’ll find out.’ Later on, the fondly remembered Sabrina recorded the song ‘Man Not a Mouse’ from the 1950s’ musical Grab Me a Gondola. In BBC TV, Yes, Minister (1980s), a minister overridden by a spokesman is asked, ‘Are you a man or a mouth?

are you going to pardon me? Catchphrase from the BBC radio show Ray’s a Laugh (1949–60), spoken by Charles Hawtrey as Mr Muggs.

are you looking for a punch up the bracket? Stock phrase of Tony Hancock in his BBC radio show, Hancock’s Half-Hour (1954–9), though merely popularized and not coined by him. For no accountable reason, ‘bracket’ refers to the nose and mouth, but really the target area is unspecified. Compare: a punch up the conk, where the nose is obviously specified – as in the BBC radio Goon Show, ‘The Mysterious Punch-Up-the-Conker’ (7 February 1957).

are you married? See OOH, YOU ARE AWFUL.

are you now or have you ever been (a member of the Communist Party)? The stock phrase of McCarthyism, the pursuit and public ostracism of suspected US Communist sympathizers at the time of the war with Korea in the early 1950s. Senator Joseph McCarthy was the instigator of the ‘witch hunts’, which led to the blacklisting of people in various walks of life, notably the film business. Those appearing at hearings of the House of Representatives Committee on UnAmerican Activities (1947-circa 1957) were customarily challenged with the full question. Are You Now Or Have You Ever Been? was the title of a radio/stage play (1978) by Eric Bentley.

are you ready, Eddie? Slogan for the Today newspaper in the UK (1986). Not an immortal slogan but worth mentioning for what it illustrates about advertising agencies and the way they work. Today, a new national newspaper using the latest production technology, was launched by Eddie Shah, hitherto known as a unionbusting printer and publisher of provincial papers. In its collective wisdom, the Wight Collins Rutherford Scott agency, charged with promoting the new paper’s launch, built the whole campaign around the above slogan. Why had they chosen it? Starting with the name ‘Eddie’ – Mr Shah being thought of as a folk hero in some quarters – the agency found that it rhymed with ‘ready’. So the man was featured in TV ads being asked this important question by his staff. Unfortunately, the ad agency had zeroed in all too well on the most pertinent aspect of the new paper’s launch. Today was not ready, and the slogan echoed hollowly from the paper’s disastrous start to the point at which Mr Shah withdrew. The phrase had earlier been used as the title of a track on the Emerson, Lake and Palmer album Tarkus (1971), where it referred to the recording engineer, Eddie Offord (to whom it had, presumably, been addressed). The same rhyme occurs in ready for Freddie, meaning ‘ready for the unexpected, the unknown or the unusual’ (according to DOAS, 1960), and was a phrase that came out of the ‘L’il Abner’ comic strip of the 1930s; are you ready for Freddy? was used as a slogan to promote the film Nightmare on Elm Street – Part 4 (US 1989) – referring to the gruesome character, Freddy Krueger.

are you ready to take the challenge? This was used in some marketing tests in 1990–1 for an unidentifed product – ‘I fill out a form and stand in line. When it came to my turn I was presented with a tray on which stood two unmarked beakers and two upturned tubs. My jolly uniformed woman smiled and said: “Are you ready to take the challenge?”’ – Independent on Sunday (23 September 1990). Taking up a challenge was originally a procedure in medieval chivalry. The knight making the challenge would throw down his gauntlet. The person accepting the challenge would formally pick it up. Mostly in political and business use, there is the phrase to meet the challenge – a cliché by the mid-20th century. It occurs along with other rhetorical clichés during the ‘Party Political Speech’ (written by Max Schreiner) on the Peter Sellers’ comedy album The Best of Sellers (1958): ‘If any part of what I say is challenged, I am more than ready to meet that challenge’. ‘With the Tories reeling from their worst nationwide election defeat in modern times, the Prime Minister [John Major] marched out to Downing Street to promise: “I will meet a challenge whenever it comes”’ – Evening Standard (London) (6 May 1994); ‘The World Bank reports: “Deficiencies in the system of legal education and training and a dearth in appropriate standards of professional ethics, have left legal practitioners complacent and unprepared to meet the challenge of their business clients competing in a global economy”’ – Financial Times (15 July 1994).