"Your ass is grass ...

[Wilson Gray]

I passed on the reviews, not being much of a movie fan. But i heard
about that particular scene from a friend who found it well worth
sitting through the rest of the movie for. And well worth the
re-telling, on numerous occasions.

-Wilson

On Wed, May 28, 2008 at 8:43 PM, Benjamin Zimmer
<bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "Your ass is grass ...
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Wed, May 28, 2008 at 8:06 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> "... and I'm the lawnmower."
>>
>> This was discussed here a while ago, but, as far as I can tell from
>> cursorily checking the archives, no dating was supplied.
>>
>> IAC, these words were spoken by the late, great Murray "Sgt. Clyde"
>> Hamilton to the late, great Tab "Rct. Andy Sheaffer" Hunter in the
>> 1956 movie, _The Girl He Left Behind._.
>>
>> I don't know whether this line was made up for the movie by Guy
>> Troper, the screenwriter. If not, it's probably older than 1956
>
> According to reviews in _Time_, the line in both the novel and the film is:
>
> "If you screw up around here, your behinds will be grass and I will be
> the lawnmower."
>
> http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,867007,00.html
> http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,808693-2,00.html
>
> Of course, the euphemization spoils the rhyme, so what's the point? :->
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
 -Sam'l Clemens

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org