"boy friend/ boyfriend" [WAS a new kind of "guy"]

[Jonathan Lighter]

Mark, this is a kid's book. Written in _1911_.

  JL

Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Mark Mandel
Subject: Re: "boy friend/ boyfriend" [WAS a new kind of "guy"]
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On 6/15/07, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>
>
> 1911 Winston Stokes, Charles Lamb & Mary Lamb_All Shakespeare's Tales_ (
> N.Y.: Stokes) 302: Troilus and Cressida... Achilles lay idly in his tent,
> listening to his boy friend Patroclus. [Not what you think, you filthy
> rotter!]


That aside makes a good case for a common sexual-attraction use of "boy
friend" in 1911.

m a m

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