SUX

[Jonathan Lighter]

Ron, if your paper on this word answers the question, please forgive me. Send me a copy if you can

The first time I heard the now familiar verb "suck" meaning "to be highly objectionable, inferior, unsatisfactory, etc." was in the spring of 1964. It became common rather quickly. (The earlier equivalent was "stink," at that time still thought moderately offensive by some parents.)

I've never found an earlier cite OR even a seemingly reliable placing of this usage any earlier; in a Bildungsroman, for example, or a long-delayed WW II novel. Even "seemingly unreliable" examples are rare.

No one I've asked has any recollection of  hearing it much before I did, though the earliest "attestations" are uniformly from the NYC area.

Did anyone on the list learn it earlier than 1964?  If not, what happened in 1963-64 that might have brought to national attention?






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