far out...

[Geoffrey Nunberg]

Fiske writes:  "Several editions ago, they added the term "far-out,"
and they have yet to remove it--even though almost no one (certainly
no one I know) uses the word today. "

Well, but the equation of "no one" and "no one I know" is always a
risky one, which is why it's always a good idea to check your facts,
particularly nowadays, when they're just a couple of clicks away. If
Fiske had troubled to do a Google search he would have found plenty
of recent cites for "far out" in the MW sense of "marked by a
considerable departure from the conventional or traditional,"
including some from the Weekly Standard itself -- "'Yeah,' he
replied. 'But after September 11, the far out's too real.'"
(03/03/2003) And a Nexis search shows the phrase coming up almost 200
times in the past month in major newspapers, a fair number of them
with the sense in question; e.g.,

Hieronymus Bosch. His work is so far-out. He depicted ice skates in
The Garden of Earthly Delights - I didn't even know they had skates
back then.

What makes "Freaky Friday" a charmer isn't how far-out things get for
this mother and daughter, but how sweet and distinctly un-freaky a
kid, her mom and their love for each other can be.

  Modigliani's painting ... was never really as far out as that of his
peers, especially Picasso.

Serious prescriptivists like Fowler and Follett did their homework
before pronouncing on the language. It gives you pause to think what
dictionaries would look like if they were compiled on Fiskean
principles: "Well, in my set people say..."

I mean, talk about decline...

Geoff Nunberg