"Don't Make Waves"

[Wilson Gray]

I first heard this phrase in 1957 as part of a joke that would never
have appeared in any newspaper of the day.

Dante is showing a group of tourists through hell. As the group
proceeds, a strange kind of chant-like murmur begins to become audible.
A tourist asks Dante about this phenomenon. Dante replies that he'll be
be glad to let the tourists see it for themselves. No sooner said than
done, Dante brings his charges to the shore of a lake of shit the size
of Lake Superior. In this lake, with the foul liquor coming up to their
lower lips, are standing thousands upon thousands of sinners, who are
all chanting in unison, "Don't make waves! Don't make waves! Don't make
waves!" And, at the dock, the tourists see the devil preparing start
the engines of a hydroplane.

-Wilson Gray


On Sep 19, 2004, at 9:44 PM, Fred Shapiro wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Fred Shapiro <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      "Don't Make Waves"
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> Is anyone able to check ProQuest Historical Newspapers for me to find
> out
> the earliest occurrence there of the phrase "don't make waves"?
> Newspaperarchive shows it as the title of a 1964 television series.
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
>
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> Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
> Associate Librarian for Collections and     YALE DICTIONARY OF
> QUOTATIONS
>   Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press,
> Yale Law School                             forthcoming
> e-mail: fred.shapiro at yale.edu
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