"I said to myself, 'Self...'" in "Moose Turd Pie"

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On 1/26/06, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The late, great Clerow Wilson Honey, AKA "Flip Wilson," was using this
> as a cathch phrase in the '60's.
>
> Cf.
>
> 1964. Pot Luck; Scepter Records SRM/SPS-520
>
> or the perhaps more-easily found
>
> 1968. Cowboys and Colored People; Atlantic Records AT 8149
>
> 1968. You Devil, You!; Atlantic Records AT 8179

Wilson, I just listened to two or three hours' worth of Flip Wilson
routines from his '60s recordings (everything I could find via
file-sharing networks). Very entertaining, but not one example of
"Self"-address. Is there a particular routine in which you remember
him using the expression?

A few people suggested Bill Cosby used it in his standup act in the
'60s, but I came up empty when I checked his recordings too.


--Ben Zimmer

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