Ragged but Right, pt. 6 ("bufay", i. e., "ofay")

[Ben Zimmer]

On Mon, Feb 6, 2012 at 9:44 PM, George Thompson wrote:
>
> The OED has "ofay" from 1899, and from the Indianapolis Freeman, at that.
>  Here is a variant form, "bufay", from the Freeman of 1903.
>
>     In 1903 P. B. R. Hendrix reported from Chicago that, "Irving Jones,
> for the past two weeks playing our leading vaudeville houses, cleaned up
> everything.  The Bufays [i. e., white performers (note by Abbott & Seroff)]
> hate for him to be on the bill with them for they have to work so hard to
> make a hit with the audience."
>
>     "P. B. R. Hendrix's Chicago Notes", *Indianapolis Freeman*, September
> 26, 1903
>
>     Lynn Abbott & Doug Seroff. * Ragged but Right: Black Traveling Shows,
> "Coon Songs," and the Dark Pathway to Blues and Jazz*.  University Press of
> Mississippi, 2007*, *p. 35; fn. 70, p. 386

The Scott Joplin scholar Edward A. Berlin notes another use of "bufay"
in that very same issue of the Freeman (9/26/03, p. 5):

---
"We are sorry to note the misfortune Mr. Scott Joplin met with his
Ragtime Opera company while filling an engagement in Springfield, Ill.
He has been doing big business, but his Bufay representative embarks
with the receipts, leaving them in a hole. They are in Chicago for the
present."
quoted in: _King of Ragtime_ (OUP 1994), p. 126
http://books.google.com/books?id=akWdAVXFmAsC&pg=PA126
---

In a footnote, Berlin speculates about "ofay" and "bufay":

---
The term "Bufay" is problematic. "Ofay," pig latin for "foe" and a
term referring to whites, was in common use by blacks of this time. I
suggest that "Bufay" means "black foe," as a black thief would have
been in this case. See discussion in my article "On Ragtime:
Understanding the Language," _CBMR Digest_ 3/3 (Fall 1990), 6-7.
---

Leaving aside the highly suspect Pig Latin explanation of "ofay", I'm
not sure Berlin is correctly interpreting "bufay" here -- Abbott &
Seroff may be right in thinking that "ofay" and "bufay" were
interchangeable. But it would be nice to see examples beyond a single
issue of a newspaper.

--bgz

--
Ben Zimmer
http://benzimmer.com/

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