zerophagy - not in OED (or should it be xerophagy?)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Thu, Nov 19, 2009 at 2:09 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>
> At 1:47 PM -0500 11/19/09, Joel S. Berson wrote:
>>Is the "zerophagy" below something new, or the author's/printer's
>>spelling of  (or error for) "xerophagy"?
>
> i.e. = 'dry-eating', as in Parolles' discursus on virginity-qua-withered-pear--
>
> "Your virginity, your old virginity, is like one of our French
> wither'd peares, it lookes ill, it eates drily, marry 'tis a wither'd
> peare"  (All's Well that Ends Well, I.i)
>
> What a relief!  "Zerophagy" sounds more like a radical new diet
> regimen that I fear would be only too effective.

The zerophages are *way* more hardcore than the breatharians.


--Ben Zimmer

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